


Autumn Aftershave

by happymaybe



Category: Avex, Johnny's Entertainment, KAT-TUN (Band), Speed (Band)
Genre: Character Death, Drama & Romance, F/M, Family Drama, Future Fic, Gen, General, Japanese Music Industry, Jin-centric fic, Various Timelines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-02
Packaged: 2018-03-04 22:52:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 21,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3095474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happymaybe/pseuds/happymaybe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A prolific, well-loved music producer died a year ago, leaving a wife still in love with him and a daughter deeply distressed with his last words to her. </p><p>Hoping to escape New York and a situation he refuses to face, former singer and actor Akanishi comes home to Japan after decades of absence. Here he meets and reunites with people that would tell three stories of lost love and the faith and endurance of finding that love again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This has been written in a period of over four years. It has been dropped and rewritten countless of times. I tried to be consistent with the over-all tone as I work on the last chapters but there’s an off chance that the style and tone is terribly inconsistent. I have also taken a lot of liberty in writing the business-related topics, relationship and history of Avex and Johnny’s & Associates. I consulted Google but if there’s some glaring mistakes, kindly let me know.

#  Prologue

 

It isn’t a grim day. The sun kisses her cheeks as she walks – leaving her face flushed with a trace of summer glow. The large, looming clouds litters the endless sky above and the crisp air is soft and fleeting against her skin.   
  
Her soles make no sound as she walks over what seems to be a brittle and chipped brick pathway. Ivies with tiny red bulbs sprout from the cracks of the graying trail and crawls all the way to the trees. The wild ivies cover the trunks entirely, like tight corsets, and curtains of thick, green leaves hang off the branches. Tall sparse shrubs with wild flowers are inconspicuous gateways to the numerous trails that branch away from the main brick road.   
  
With the media circus gone to the next town and all the tedious paperwork done, she finally has the time to mourn.  
  
She had a good life with him; he was a good man. He was dependable with uncanny wit. He wasn’t jaded and was easy to read. He liked his steak medium rare and his aftershave smelt like autumn.  
  
It was easy, so easy to picture forever with him.  
  
As she walks further down the narrow pathway, the dark green leaves of the trees shade her from the sun. The hill is quiet except for the usual summer choir of singing crickets and telltale buzzing of the beetles deep in the forest and the occasional chirping of the birds somewhere in the wood area. She would hear a quiet rustle behind her and she distracts herself thinking that those are simply some tiny woodland creatures being friendly and nothing else. Soon enough, she steps into a clearing.   
  
The clearing gives way to a small Buddhist cemetery with most graves abandoned and weathered. She stalls feet away from his tombstone. She shifts her weight, and heaves a shallow, short sigh. Her vision almost blackened out as she strains her eyes looking up at the sun.  
  
The wind has picked up by the time she crossed that seemingly never-ending distance to his grave. Her eyes glaze over the impersonal family plot marker and her eyes feel tired and too dry.  
  
She falls on her knees, slowly, and touches the frame perched at the center. She traces her fingers over his smiling face and eyes that shine and wrinkle in bliss she barely remembers now. She can almost feel warmth from the tips of her fingers. She trembles as she remembers him but her eyes remain dry.   
  
A stronger wind breezes through and there seems to be a promise of rain tonight.   
  



	2. Chapter 2

Jin hovers by the glass door and tries to ignore the measuring look of a man in a pinstripe suit. He then moves to lean against the wall and stares at the ceiling as the man opens the door. He hears the soft music and the laughter inside but the sound ended as the door closes with a _thud_.  
  
It’s quiet again – lest for the echoing footsteps of the patrolling guard who just rounded a corner. The hallway is whitewashed, spotless and polished – even the lighting fixture above him is blinding white. Everything around him seems pale, loose and fragile, like a dying man. Across him stands a wall-to-floor glass window that sees over a view of a forest down the hill. It’s a rather sad sight with just a clump of unmoving dark trees and not even a single dot of city light can be seen.  
  
He glances at his watch and considers, _re_ considers, for a good minute before finally pushing the door open.  
  
His eyes squint as he adjusts to the lighting of the hall. He pauses as the smell of oil, canvass… and money and wine wafts. It’s all too familiar, he thinks as he pushes himself from his spot by the door.  
  
There aren’t much people inside - mostly just women in cocktail dresses – their voices soft and high-pitched, and men in their crisp suits – uninterested and unimpressed. Some, but just a handful of them, are in bolder statement shirts that make little sense, jeans with the strangest cuts, tattered bohemian skirts, and vintage vests covered in army patches. These few ones seem out of place but their colors and smiles, and loud laughter and wild gestures anchor life in this company of people mostly in muted colors with weathered faces, twisted with searing discontent at the world.

The busy room, with all the constant movements, swirling colors, and hushed conversations is giving Jin a mild case of migraine.  
  
“Excuse me.”  
  
Jin sidesteps immediately when a guy roughly elbows him. Jin follows the guy with a stern look until the other vanishes amongst the crowd in one corner of the hall. Jin tries to be subtle as he loiters but he tries, always tries, to poise with much regal, faux arrogance and confidence as his former and faded status can muster. Survival instinct, he would later justify.  
  
People aren’t even looking in his direction. Jin wants to laugh.  
  
Not too long after, the crowd parts and Jin hears loud footsteps towards him.  
  
“Jin!” Maru waves as he walks. “You came!” He says, breathless.

Jin meets him midway, “Yeah, yeah. Friends forever.”  
  
Maru smiles at that, his age obvious with his receding hairline and wrinkles and tell-tale laugh lines. “Thank you, Jin.”  
  
Jin fidgets, ducking his head down and scrunching his nose like the world in general is distasteful, “No problem.” He whispers, his tone a bit annoyed, and Maru laughs, slinging his arm over Jin’s shoulder. “Come on then. They have this amazing stuffed avocado and chicken croquettes I know you pretend to hate.”

***

No one seems to notice him as he moves quietly amongst the crowd, rounding some of the exhibits, sparing the murals a glance or two. He would stop by a particular canvass and feign interest for a minute or two and then would circle a certain installation and wear a face of absolute fascination.  
  
Jin is about to lean down and try to touch the hanging spray-painted metal…. thing, only to be reprimanded by one of those roving art critics.  
  
Jin smiles politely, acting his age again, at the woman only to receive a loud _tsk_ in return as she marches off.  
  
Jin has never considered himself as an artist. He can sing, that’s all. A wide vocal range, his voice coach once said; strong lungs, his late father would comment off-handedly when someone praises his son in front him. God bless his old man, Jin smiles to himself as he walks over another installation at the far end of the aisle.  
  
Jin blinks as he tilts his head to the side to look at the sparsely clad mannequin hanging upside down. A thick, threaded copper wire hanging from the exposed brass tubes in the ceiling is coiled around its left arm and right thigh and while its neck hangs solemnly, the tips of its teased, electric red hair are touching the floor. A floral-printed threadbare dress is thrown over its body and its face is white and smiling but there are three black teardrops just below its left eye.  
  
“They say that teardrop tattoo means that the person has killed someone.”  
  
Jin nods, and distinctly does not glance back at the person who has suddenly stepped behind him. He gestures vaguely at the mannequin. “Is there some political or cultural reference I am missing?”  
  
The other rolls her eyes. “It doesn’t suit you one bit. You don’t dress the part for once.”  
  
Jin throws his head back, laughing, as he turns on the ball of his heel. “Fierce as ever, Arakaki.” He pauses. “You look old.”  
  
Hitoe doesn’t seem too pleased and punches his arm, “Asshole as ever, Akanishi. You’re not doing that bad either. You’re starting to look like Kitagawa himself. Congratulations.”  
  
Jin decides to ignore that. “Should have known you’ll be here. That graffiti at the entrance screams your name all over.” Jin pauses. “This mannequin looks impressive though.”  
  
Hitoe’s face twists like she has just drunk a thick lemon puree. “Shut up.” She says, sounding equal part exhausted and annoyed. “I hate this place. Pretentious pieces of shit.”  
  
“Of course of all people, _you_ would know, wouldn’t you?” Jin asks, falling into a quiet step behind as Hitoe starts walking around the art gallery.  
  
Hitoe raised her middle finger at him without even facing him, without much of preamble. “You’re not having such a fantastic night, I presume?” Jin asks, teasing.  
  
“Obviously tonight is the highlight of my career.” Hitoe stops at a particular mural, a black and white cubist mural of the Leaning Tower of Pisa in flames. It looks nice.

Hitoe gestures wildly, fingers pointing at various parts of the canvass. “Not even a half-decent shading.”  
   
“Hey. Don’t be like that. My friend organized this event.” Jin says as they move to another painting.  
  
The string quartet in the middle of the gallery seems to be playing a crowd favorite as people pause in their small talks and make a simultaneous sound of approval.  
  
Hitoe picks up her pace and ignores people greeting her. Jin follows her and tries to look as indifferent as his barely choked down chuckle can muster.  
  
“Nakamura, I know. I like him. He’s nice. That’s why I’m here.” She grits, her mouth opening just a millimeter.  
  
Jin sighs, “Naka _maru_. But yeah.”  
  
“ _Toh-may-toh, toe-mah-toe_.” She says in perfect English and waves a hand at him dismissively.  
  
“You’d think after all these years people will start remembering his name.” Jin mutters as they skirt around a complex-looking woodwork.   
  
“I need a smoke. Let’s smoke – Don’t give me a crap about you quitting.” Hitoe turns her head back at him and glares.  
  
“Fine.” Jin raises his hands. “You’ve always been so bossy. That’s why you never got married.”  
  
Hitoe looks at him, “And that’s coming from you?”  
  
Jin laughs, loud and the sound is foreign even in his own ears. With that Hitoe eyes him for a second, and Jin feels naked, before dropping the topic as well.

***

They sneak outside and smoke at the back of the lot, just directly below the veranda of the 2nd floor gallery. It’s a bit humid and their hair has static all over. It’s going to rain, Jin thinks.  
  
The music of the string quartet and chatter of the people inside drift through the open door of the veranda. Strange enough, the voices inside seem to be distant and muted – like they’re from another world, miles away. Jin feels like an outsider. Just like before.  
  
There are sacks of abandoned sand, pebbles and grovels at their sides. The lone wheelbarrow by the wall has lost one of its wheels and it looks nothing but trash and a mere crippled ghost of its once productive days. The building doesn’t look that modern and _Contemporary Asian_ when you look at it from the back with its unfinished paintjob, rickety woodwork, and loose shilling. Pretentious piece of shit indeed.  
  
Few meters from where they are, stands a railing just before a deep hill slope. Jin can see a small cluster of lights beyond the trees below. It’s probably a small town in the outskirts of the city that attracts a number of tourists during the holidays and school breaks because of their clay handicrafts and inexpensive bed and breakfast.  
  
“When did you return?” Hitoe asks, her face half in shadow, half in a soft glow of the lighted tip of her cigarette.  
  
Jin’s eyes remain in the cluster of lights of the village; he wrings his hands, hoping to lose some tension. “For a while now. Four months?”  
  
“That long? You’ve been awfully low in the radar. Why?”  
  
Jin shakes his head, trying to shift his attention back to Hitoe. He stands straight and stretches his arms a bit. There’s a slight ache at the small of his back. “Nothing much.” Jin pauses to sigh, “Just needed to fix some things concerning the group’s royalties. Apparently some asshole of an ex-producer thought of butchering our contract.” Jin walks towards the railings and leans down.  
  
Hitoe laughs, “Oh. And _you_ are the one fixing it?”  
  
Jin tries to indulge her with a small smile but it might have come out as a grimace because she has stopped laughing.  
  
She flicks the filter off the ground instead and steps on it. “And? Things aren’t settled with that yet?”  
  
“Almost there. Hopefully.”  
  
Jin hears Hitoe light another cigarette. “Don’t you have a business in New York?”  
  
“Someone is taking care of the store. I need to be here. And besides, I missed Japan. Nostalgia, it comes with the age.” He pauses and fights down the urge to light another stick himself. “How about you? How are the twins?”  
  
“They’re fine. The boy is off to some soul searching somewhere in Kenya. And the girl is in law school.”  
  
“That sounds good. So the boy did take after you?”  
  
“Unfortunately, yes.” Jin sneaks a glance at Hitoe and sees her smiling fondly, eyes lost in the moonless skies above as she puffs out a cloud of gray smoke. It’s a quiet moment. If he can only ignore that ache in his back, he can almost fool himself on what year is it now.  
  
Jin leans down the railing again. He strains his eyes below, trying to make out something from the dead silent forest.  
  
Only moments ago a heavy rain is just beyond the horizon but there seems to be a change of weather. The ground isn’t steaming off and the wind feels crisp and cold, exactly how an autumn night should feel.  
  
“I know it’s been years and you probably don’t care but Takako’s husband died a year ago.” Hitoe says so soft that if Jin wants to ignore it, he can.  
  
Jin faces her instead, “Yeah. I heard he was a great guy.”  
  
It is Hitoe who looks away from Jin. A stretch of silence passes and Jin sees Hitoe fighting with herself, her face twisting in annoyance for a moment before finally, sighing, giving up.  
  
Jin frowns, “What?”  
  
“Nothing. Nothing. It’s just that…”  
  
Jin groans, almost. “To be honest, I haven’t even thought of her for years now. _Years_.”  
  
Hitoe seems to not hear him though. She has her eyes narrowed, like she’s about to finish a complicated brain teaser. “Tell me, Akanishi, is there someone you left in New York? Someone waiting for you?”  
  
Jin laughs in the darkness. “Hitoe. What’s this all about?”  
  
“Nothing.” Hitoe clicks her tongue as she throws the cigarette butt on the ground. “I think I drank too much.”   
  
“Spit it out, Arakaki.” Jin exhales. Tonight seems to be longer than he initially thought it will be.  
  
Hitoe takes her time answering, measuring her words in her head first. “I just always thought you two looked great together.” Her eyes steady on his uneasy ones.  
  
Jin gives up and closes his eyes. He feels like laughing, so loud and so carefree. His knees aren’t that strong anymore and his joints ache all over during the coldest nights of the year. He just had a brush with death as he got himself a minor stroke three years ago when he was in Acapulco for a business trip. And yet, this is the only the time he has truly felt his age.  
  
“I’m 53, Hitoe. If ever we had our chance, we are decades late.”


	3. Chapter 3

When Junko was younger, they would visit her grandparents in Hyogo every summer. It’s the sort of town where everyone knows everybody and everyone likes each other – or perhaps pretends to. The wise ones stay in the town for their whole lives – living simplicity to the fullest and taking advantage of territorial competence; while some, of bigger imaginations and stronger will, who had their time in the busier cities would come back after few decades and spend their last days back in their childhood homes at the foothills of the mountains, with the blue seas just around the corner, over the hill and few stones and hops away.

She would play with her brother, cousins, second cousins, and sons and granddaughters and grandsons, nieces and nephews of the neighbors, of his father’s childhood friends and old lovers, and of strangers. The sea is just a drive away and she would spend endless summer nights waiting for the stars with sands itchy on her back and her hair smelling like salt for weeks.

She had her first love when she was twelve. She can’t remember much about that boy now but she’s certain he wasa foot taller than her and had bronze-tanned skin that was unique to the locals of that fishing village she’d frequently visited.

At that time she thought the world of this kid and his small-town humor and big-city charm. He called her Jun- _na_ with a weird accent in the second syllable and she never got to know why. She knows she had loved his smile but, strange enough, by December of the same year, she couldn’t remember his face anymore.

Her grandfather died that January and her father decided to move his grandmother to a hospice near them in Tokyo.

She hasn’t returned since then.

***

“You loved this town. Do you remember?”

The sun is barely up. The cold, unsettling air is an indication of the coming change of season as the trees are starting to shed their leaves. Stillness seems to blanket over the awakening woods but the crackling sound of the crushed leaves echoes through the woods as they walk over the strewn foliage on the pathway. Despite the sad, dragging mood autumn seems to be synonymous with, Junko can’t help but feel calm as camphor leaves fall and land on the cold ground.

“Yes. The people here are nice.” Junko says, quiet.

Takako turns to her. “They loved you. The people here. They loved your father. You have his eyes and nose.” Takako laughs, like there’s a joke somewhere.

Junko slows down and falls a step behind her mother. She watches Takako carry herself with an air of kept grace so scarcely seen in women of her mother’s age. It’s beyond wisdom brought by age – much more than that.

Her mother seems to see the world as something little above a lark.  And yet, her gestures speak volumes of genuine sincerity and respect. She finds everything and everyone endlessly fascinating in the same way a young son treats his estranged father who just came home from a war. 

“You loved him, didn’t you, Mom?”

Takako doesn’t pause, she doesn’t seem unnerved. Junko’s a bit taken aback.

 “Of course. He was my husband.” Takako says, humor in the edges of her even tone. She tilts her head to face Junko.

The sun has risen quite a considerable altitude in the past minute. Stray morning lights seep through the balding branches of the trees and all the sunshine and cheer of the early sun has gathered in Takako’s face – blinding, transparent. Junko has always been overwhelmed by the amount of stored youth in that familiar, wrinkled smile.

 "He was your father.” Takako says, finally, and continues walking again.

 Junko doesn’t say anything anymore.

***

 It has been over a year and Junko has yet to see a day that Takako has run out of stories of Enou. The stories often seem to hold no, or rather little, significance. But as Takako tells another story of an argument they had years ago, she has this wistful smile that says these stories probably hold more water than the seas near them.

Takako arranges and cleans his grave with such precise, calculated move that mirrors when he was in still in the ICU and it’s his hospital bed she’s making; or even years ago when tumor was not a threat and it was his dinner she was badly trying to cook.   

Junko wonders if this is love.

***

 Junko often remembers Enou’s last words to her whenever she’s on the train back to Tokyo and the view of endless rice fields distracts her:

  _“You’ll always be my daughter.”_


	4. Chapter 4

As the door closes behind her, Julie sighs and glares at nothing in particular.

“Who taught him that?”

“You?”

Julie cringes, waving a hand at Ken. “Rhetorical question, Mr. Hiromichi. Learn that, will you?”

“But, if I may say,” Ken promptly ignores her and adjusts the tower of papers and folders in his arms as he hurries to Julie’s side. “Your son is doing an excellent job.”

It’s a Wednesday morning and for the past five years, twice a month the Los Angeles boardroom on the 3rd floor of the Parkwe Square building is reserved for a closed-door meeting of the EVPs with the company advisers. The weather outside is cold and the wind is presumably crisp, and if given a chance to be sharpened, the autumn air could possibly slice through even the thickest skin. Outside, people are feeling languid, their movements lazy and the idea of the early autumn this year is making their mind wander to the prospect of a holiday full of cheers and color with their loved ones, rather that the melancholic scenarios induced by the bland, sepia-toned mood of the fall season.

Inside the building, people are walking quietly in the corridors, their footsteps falling into a rhythm of a lullaby, and talking in hushed tones, their overheard conversations sloshing through the air like quiet, running water. Paper cups half-filled with lukewarm coffee are left forgotten on desks. It’s the midweek condition where people lust over the idea of the coming weekend.

Julie’s movements are quicker and brusquer than what you’d expect for someone her age. But as she rounds a corner, she swallows an urge to wheeze and cough, her knees wobbly and weak. There was once a stupid idea that exercise and good diet will make you healthy and strong and young for eternity. Wait till you’re 71 with one working kidney and pathetic joints, and you’ll realize the travesty those milk and cereals commercials are. 

Her son is close to banning her from coming to the office. Foolish child. Old age and faulty kidney won’t stop her from meddling. Her son is too optimistic and too opportunistic for the company’s own good. She built this company from the shadows of her own uncle. The great Johnny Kitagawa had the idea, the eye for the glitz and the desire to be a legend but it was she and her mother who made the framework and the backbone, who fitted the missing pieces in the puzzle and the one who buried the corpses in the dead of the night – to say it  _politely_ .

Julie steps in an empty elevator with Ken trailing behind her. An upcoming single of some unit she barely knows is playing in the speakers. The absurdity of the lyrics makes her reflect on the future of this once great country – no, empire.  But she’d say none of it. She doesn’t know a thing about market trend and sales nowadays. Oh, just a few years ago, it was she who ruled over that.

Ken is still sprouting garbage with that patronizing, squeaky voice of his that reminds her of some hungry dog.  Dog he certainly is, with that day-old stubble on his chin, dark shaggy hair that parts at the middle. Even his movement is pup-like - quick and enthusiastic.

“Ken, honey.” She pauses as she steps out of the lift. “Can you please get me a glass of water? I need to take my meds.”

“- and the sales are all-time –  _oh._ Okay. No problem – uh.” Ken is about to hurry off to the pantry when he suddenly pauses in his tracks and stares down at the bundled paper on his arms, his eyeglasses sitting dangerously askew on the ridge of his nose.

“Leave those at Inoue’s table.” Julie clips as she walks off to her office.

***

By the time Ken enters her office, Julie is already on the phone, pacing around the room with two medicine bottles in her left hand. Ken quietly crosses the room and places the glass of water on her table.

“It doesn’t matter. Kick those off the shelves. I don’t have a board of directors to please. No.  _No_ . Listen to me – ” Julie throws her head back and frowns at the ceiling. “ _Jesus._ Listen to  _yourself_ – No, I will not sit this down. My son doesn’t know what he’s doing – Yes. Of course!”

Ken stands idly by her study and watches her stomp around the room with a zest of someone half her age.

“Thanks.” Julie says to him when she finally gets off the phone. Seconds ago she seemed almost like Sweeney, ready to drop Fat Man over to whomever she was speaking with; but now she’s back to looking her age, withwillowy gray hair, crouched form and wrinkled, spotted skin. She opens the cap of the first bottle and pops a pill into her mouth before gulping it down with water.

It’s an unusual moment of vulnerability and Ken finds an odd ounce of pleasure that he’s able to see such rarity.

“Who are we expecting this afternoon?” Julies asks after struggling with the cap of the second bottle.

“Akanishi.”

Julie nods, “Okay.” She walks over her the table. “But,” She grabs a notepad as she sits on her chair and flips through some pages. Ken stands at her side, waiting.

“I thought that that Kuzogi guy from the legal counsel is the one dealing with this one?” Julie closes the notepad and stares at him, her fingers tracing the tight weaved spine of the notepad.

“That. Yeah.” Ken exhales, like he’s been holding it for hours now, “The legal counsel says he’s all yours. They can’t find a way to work the 2006 modified affidavit with the group’s demands. Now with Cooper MIA and all.”

“Yes. I know. Ito told me that already. What I don’t understand is why I’m the one who’s supposed to talk him about this. And Cooper has been MIA for three years now and we should all know he’s as good as dead.” She pulls her laptop and opens it. “I hope they would stop blaming the man for all the recent stupidity in company.”

Ken coughs, his mouth twitching, “Ito said that Akanishi likes you. You might be able to… you know, buy some time?”

“Why can’t we just pay them? We all know we’re going to end up doing that anyway.”

“Pride? I think it’s pride. And a quarter of a billion yen.” Ken offers.

“Mr. Hiromichi.” Julie looks pained. “That was a rhetorical question.” 

Ken shrugs.

“What time are we expecting him?” Julie taps her fingers on the keyboard.

“In an hour.”

Julie doesn’t say anything anymore. A mechanical metronome sits at Julie’s table and the rhythmic ticking sound bounces inside the room like tiny tennis balls. The black metal base shines as the faint streak of the late morning sunlight hits its surface.

The room is as quiet with just the occasional paper rustling interrupting the infinite beat set by the metronome.

Cooper and Ishikawa should really die, if they’re not yet dead that is. She needs to get hold of the company’s legal counsel and her son and that poor excuse for an associate director for finances. They should just stop this idiocy. This would just cost them more than a quarter of a billion if Kamenashi decides to step in.

Julie moves to grab her notepad when Ken quickly hands it to her instead.

“Why are you still here?” Julie barely conceals her sigh as she uncaps a pen and starts writing.

“It’s not everyday you’re here in the office, so I thought maybe you need more of my assistance?” Ken smiles brightly at her.

Julie stops writing and raises her eyes at him. She smiles at him, a wide wolfish one, and gathers her hands in front her, “Honey. I was sending death threats to journalists and playing Go with the Minister of Finance even before your parents reached high school. I believe I can manage myself.”

Ken stares at her. Julie snaps her finger, “Mr. Hiromichi. Go. Eat lunch or something. Just leave me alone. I need to seriously detoxify this company.”

Ken is about to say something when a knock on the door interrupts him.

“Miss Julie, were you expecting someone from Avex today?”  Inoue opens the door and peeks inside the room, her hands firmly placed on the doorjamb.

Julie frowns at Ken, “Were we?”

“No. I don’t believe so.” He says but he checks his organizer anyway, thumb scrolling the touch screen. “Nope. Nothing here.”

“Well, she’s waiting...?” Inoue gestures at the direction of the lounge outside and darts a questioning look from Julie to Ken.

“It’s fine. Let her in.” Julie waves her off and the girl excused herself wordlessly.

“What does Avex want now?” Julie mutters to herself as she arranges the clutter on her table. Ken collects her medicine bottles and the empty glass of water; the items clinking as Ken gathers them in his arms.

“I’ll be going now. Ring for me if you need me, Miss Julie.” He says before bowing. Julie nods at him distractedly, still muttering to herself vaguely about market chess game, industry oligarchy and crab mentality.

As Ken opens the door, he’s suddenly faced with a woman with doe-like eyes and pale skin. “Hi.” She says.

“Ah yes, the one from Avex? Miss Julie is waiting for you.” Ken smiles at her smoothly and sidesteps to let her in.

“Thank you.” The woman says as she passes by him. Without looking back, Ken closes the door behind him.

“Hi. I’m Julie Fujishima Hirai.” Julie moves from behind her desk to greet her.

The pendulum at the middle of the metronome swings –  _tick –_ another beat, –  _tick_ –another pulse.

She bows, “Sorry for coming without an appointment. I’m Junko Hamada.”

***

“Please take a seat.” Julie gestures as she leans back in her chair.

Junko gingerly takes her seat in front of Julie’s desk. Julie hides a small smile as she brazenly observes Junko from head to toe.

“Are you the daughter of  _the_ Enou Hamada?”

“Yes.” Junko nods, her hands perfectly still on her lap.

Julie’s face falls, frowning. “Ah. My condolences, dear.”

It was a slow reaction, but Junko smiles blankly at Julie’s words. Julie blinks at her reaction.

“Oh I’m sorry.” Junko snaps out of her reverie. She genuinely looks apologetic. “It’s just that it’s been over a year since he passed away and my mother and I are still getting that from people. It’s heart-warming.” She breathes deep, “We miss him badly, especially when we see that his passing still gets this reaction from a lot of people.”

Julie looks at her for a moment, studying her expression and the way Junko sits there in front of Julie like she fits there, almost like this Junko Hamada has always been in her office. It’s not because there’s an air of disrespect, no, there’s none of such – but this Junko Hamada looks rather at home, at ease. Her expression is soft and something about her is somewhat familiar, but Julie can’t put her finger on it.. 

“Well, your father was one of the last few good souls in the industry with an actual beating heart. He had more emotions than eighty percent of the people in the industry combined. Me included.” Julie rests her head on the ball of her palm, her elbow bended and propped on the edge of the desk. “He’s quite the brilliant talent maker.” Julie says as an afterthought.

“Thank you.” Junko says.

Julie smiles broadly, all white teeth and gums, and looking comfortable in her lazy slouch with her chin resting on her palms, stray tufts of gray hair framing her small face. “He’d have been delighted to hear that.” Julie pauses, “Oh. This is interesting. How’s your mother?”

“She’s still in Hyogo. But I believe she’s due here in Tokyo this weekend. She’s still active in the agency you see.”

Julie hums and tilts her head to a side, looking vaguely fascinated.

The brass pendulum at the middle of metronome glimmers under the fluorescent light. Its movement is hypnotic – swinging and swaying – and its rhythmic ticking leaves a fleeting tingling sensation in Julie’s ears and the sound somehow eases up her nerves.

Junko smiles unsurely, “I’m sorry for my sudden visit.”

“Ah yes, I almost forgot.” Julie snaps out of her reverie and laughs. Junko finds the sound of her laughter soothing, like jazz and whiskey on a payday. 

“I could have sworn for a moment there I was expecting you and we’re actually here to talk about your wonderful parents.” She pauses,her eyes glazing with weathered mirth. “So tell me, dear, what can I do for Avex?”

 


	5. Interlude i

**_(Summer, 2012)_ **

_He pockets his lighter as the stoplight turns green._

_"Manhattan has an excellent sewerage system.” He glances back at her._

_She looks at him, “Seriously?”_

_“Seriously what?” He laughs as his worn-out loafer hits a puddle of water in the sidewalk. The water splashes to the dirtied pavement, the splattering sound drowning in the high-pitched honking of cars at the nearby intersection._

_A roll of thunder is heard and the movement of the people around them suddenly becomes quicker, a pace short of being frantic – the man in a suit (Matt, 31, married with a mistress) types in his phone hurriedly, the waitress across the street (Catherine, 24, single mother) swiftly sidesteps as she opens the door, balancing a tray on her hand and tries to smile at the new customer of the night, the driver of a yellow cab (Dan, 46, widower) screams at the truck in front of him, his foot itchy on the gas._

_It’s early evening and half of the city is eating their dinner at the comfort of their homes – husbands boasting the spoils of their day, wives hearing and nodding but never listening; the other half (minus two) is on their way to their favorite diners (for a chat), hotel restaurants (for a business dinner) and cafés that serve the sweetest coffees (for a moment of solitude, perfect for a night like this) – young people laughing with springs on the balls of their feet, older ones whining under their breaths and cursing their lack of time, lack of person in their lives to prepare dinner for them and lack of everything else._

_It’s been raining for days and the pavements seem to never dry but earlier today the city was treated to a morning of brief sunshine. But as the beggar (Call-me-Bruce-Wayne, unknown) at the corner looks up to the sky, the coming night seems to be of a moonless, heavy clouds kind again.  Another lightning colors the darkened sky and few, good souls sigh away the temporary bliss of dry pant sleeves._

_“Seriously, you’re talking to me about sewerage system?” She scoffs as she coils a pashmina around her neck, the rock on her ring finger shining as she walks below a flickering lamppost._

_“It’s really amazing.” He laughs and the sound echoes through the damp city._


	6. Chapter 6

 

Jin is counting the number of leaves on the cornices while the receptionist argues with a young man in a pressed trouser and thick-rimmed glasses – it’s almost cliché, but Jin wouldn’t even think about it. There’s a lot of hissing and I-told-you-so’s and the girl has emptied the file cabinet already. The young man is elbow deep in the mess on the floor, legs sprawled and all, flipping through papers after papers, the dozen lines on his forehead prominent and frankly, quite startling for his age. They’re talking about a lost file folder and a CD sample but other details are beyond Jin as he has lost interest after five minutes of eavesdropping.

Jin has his head tilted back, the top of his head leaning against the wall. He’s thinking of a million things and one when the door opens.

“Ah!” Julie turns to the receptionist and the young man, eyes widening at the clutter on the floor for half a second, “Inoue! Hiromichi! Why didn’t you tell me Mr. Akanishi was already here?” She means to sound livid, a quiet simmering kind of anger, but her voice is airy enough to know it’s in fact the opposite. There’s a tucked smile on her wrinkled face that is both unnerving and nostalgic at the same time for Jin.

The young man blinks from the floor, “He said not to disturb you….” He says unsurely, his forehead creasing tenfold, but Julie isn’t listening.

“Akanishi. I’m sorry, I was just talking to someone. How long have you been here, son?” She says as she walks to him, her steps noticeably sluggish but still with the bounce of undeterred excitement.

“Half an hour? It’s fine.” Jin stands to his full height, but it feels nothing like when he was 20 and young and strong.  He then bows to her, deep like when he was 20 and young and stupid. When he straightens again he notices a young woman trailing after Julie.

Julie shakes her head and smiles – a crooked-all-gums-all-teeth kind that is undeniably of a childlike mischief, “I’m sorry about that. But look who I have here.” She gestures to the woman behind her. “Junko Hamada. Takako Hamada nee Uehara’s daughter.”

Jin breaks into a huge smile, and almost laughs. “Oh wow.” He pauses and looks at Junko. “Hi. Sorry, this is just….” He trails off, throwing an amused pointed look at Julie, who raises her brows at him, grinning like an aging medieval duchess – pompous and dire wicked.

“I’m Jin Akanishi. Forgive the old lady. She has a weird, tactless humor. I used to date your mother back when I could still dance and your mother didn’t know how to cook.”

“Junko Hamada. Nice to meet you.”  She smiles at him. “And my mom still doesn’t know how to cook.” 

 

***

 

“Shouldn’t you be resting? I heard you just got out of surgery a month ago.” Jin approaches the window behind Julie’s desk and peeks through the blinds, squinting at the afternoon sun.

“And miss another meeting? I haven’t been in this building for just three months and my wonderful daughter-in-law is running wild already. Like a goose. I could say like a mad dog but that would be so unimaginative of me.” Julie leans back in her chair, eyes closed. She breathes deep and slow. There’s a whizzing sound.

Julie stares at the hypnotic swinging movement of the pendulum, her eyes slowly fluttering close. The faint yellow glow of the brass finish of the pendulum blends blandly with the polished black metal exterior of its base, making a blinding halo-like glimmer around the metronome.

“I heard she’s going out with one of the in-house songwriters.” Jin glances back and all he sees is her messy bun of white hair.

Julie snorts gracelessly, her eyes closed. “Your channel of grapevine is courteous. She’s doing it with a Junior and she bought him a second-hand car.”

“Second-hand?”

“Apparently she still likes them better matured and experienced.” Julie sighs long-sufferingly and Jin laughs quietly to himself.

Jin moves around the office, making a quiet rustling sound that almost sets Julie to sleep. He’s looking at the frames perched on the shelves; his fingers tracing generations of Japan’s brightest pop stars. There at the middle is a shop photo of six boys in the most ridiculous looking pirate costumes. All six have varying expression that ranges from pure enthusiasm to somber concentration – hair plastered to their sweaty foreheads, fingers gripping their microphones like their life depended on it, adrenaline rushing. Jin shivers as he remembers. The spotlights in the photo are blinding, mesmerizing – exactly like the future they were all dreaming of once upon a time. Jin wonders how a flimsy paper like this is able to capture a lifetime of stories.

“You’ve always liked KAT-TUN.”

“Someone has to love the black sheep.” Julie mutters under her breath.

Jin rolls his eyes, a gesture for himself, not for any audience. “But you like Yamapi the most.”

“Well, he  _was_ the Golden Boy.”

“Still the ever witty you.” He says more to himself. With one last sweeping look at pictures, he turns around and moves towards the table at the middle of the office. “Please, if you’re tired I can just go ahead.” He sits at the chair in front of her.

Jin glances at the metronome. Thirty years later the irritating object is still here. Somewhere deep in Jin, his heart swells in seeing it again. 

Julie opens one eye and glares, a spark of fierceness still alive in that glassy, black orb. “Please. Do not insult me.” She says but it still took her five minutes to sit properly.

“I have set up a dinner with my son and the people concerned. I’ll settle this – tell your lot that. Please forgive the idiocy that is running rather rampant in this company.”

She reaches to touch an empty water glass on her table, her finger swirling and doodling absentmindedly on the condensation on the surface. The glass catches the sunlight pouring from the window and Jin is momentarily blinded by the sudden brightness.

“Please don’t die on us anytime soon. How can we ever survive without you?” Jin chuckles at length, when he finally averts his eye from the glass.

Julie sighs and grumbles, “With the hell of unfinished business I’d have, I’d most likely wind up as a poltergeist.” She looks at him, straight and hard, then she breaks into a familiar easy smile, “But then again, this company could probably use a new, turn of the decade urban legend.”

Jin feels silly; thirty years later he’s still sitting in front of her, listening to this wizened woman like he’s sixteen and was caught having sex inside one of the company vans.  When you think about it, not much has changed.

It’s a quiet moment with Jin sitting across Julie, watching her slip in and out of stupor. Julie doesn’t dismiss him; Jin doesn’t excuse himself out.

Jin has always been sure he really was Julie’s favorite.

“She was here for a personal cum business reason. It’s sadly none of your business. At this point, that is.” Julie cuts through the silence, glassy eyes looking at him, unblinking.

“Sorry?”

“You were thinking what is Takako Hamada’s daughter doing in the office of Julie Fujishima when she was the cruel heartless bitch who made you two break up when you were young, stupid and hormonal.” Julie says evenly.

Jin laughs at that. “Actually, no. I was thinking of ditching Junno’s invitation for a drink tonight.” Jin pauses as he leans back in his chair, “But none of my business, you say? I’m intrigued. Is this reverse-psychology?”

“Never do you mind. It’s nothing important.” Julie says, breathing deep again as she cranks her neck.

Jin rocks his legs, a trait Julie hates, and gathers his hand under his chin, “And it was Ms. Mary’s idea, not you. I know.”

“Mine. Give me more credit, Akanishi. I’m as heartless as my mother. And I’ll cut your legs! Stop that.”

Jin laughs so silly, so free it almost hurts but he does stop rocking his legs.

The sun is descending in the shadowy horizon outside, and the golden light seeps through the blinds, dancing on the creased hollows of her neck; Julie looks small and harmless.

“Do you know anything about her father? Takako Uehara’s husband?”

Jin looks at her, stalling. “Not much. He died last year?”

Julie closes her eyes again and brings her hands on her face. For a stretch of a moment, she covers her entire face. Her back is hunched over and her breathing is deep and low.

The metronome continues to tick and beat and pulse – counting an invisible rhythm.  And as the yellow afternoon sunlight slowly turns to orange, the glimmer of the brass slowly fades.

When Julie straightens on her seat again, she’s looking straight at Jin, eyes clear and soft.

“Enou Hamada. He’s a music producer, mostly for Avex but he also had solo works and collaborations outside Avex. With Toy Factory, in particular.”

Jin nods. “And you’re telling me this because?”

“He’s a good friend of Cooper and the godfather of Ishikawa’s second son.”

The ice on the empty glass melts and as one ice chip slides down, it clinks against the interior of the glass. The sound slices through the silence.

Julie struggles for nonchalance as she shrugs, seems like there’s a million things to say but she’s tired, too tired. Her eyes are fluttering close. “But I’m not… implying anything.” She exhales.

“Of course, of course.” Jin whispers. He looks at the ceiling and sees the ugly cornices again.

 ***

 The sun has dipped lower in the horizon, covering the room with scorching red light that is painful in eyes and skin. Julie’s assistant – the young man earlier – brings in a blanket and covers her. Jin stands at one side, watching as Julie is tucked and petted like a child.

“She tries too hard.” Jin says.

Ken straightens up, “She does, doesn’t she.” There’s a small smile on his face as he looks at Julie peacefully sleeping on her chair, head cradled by her arms on the desk, a mess of gray hair splayed across the surface.

“And you guys let her? You patronize her.”

“This makes her happy, Mr. Akanishi.”  Ken turns to look at the older. Jin shakes his head at the other –  _It’s useless_ , Jin doesn’t say.

Ken says nothing anymore and wordlessly half-bows to Jin before closing the door.

***

The building never sleeps; this company never rests. There’s always one more routine to practice, two more radio shows to record, three more costumes to fit, four more interviews to do and five more future pop stars to look after.

Jin already has the two top buttons of his dress shirt undone as he walks down the hallway.

If in the morning, the people in the corridor were walking somewhat languidly, reminiscent of lazy Sunday afternoon, this early evening has poor souls running like mindless zombies with sluggish, uncoordinated movement, unkempt hair, dark circles around their eyes and empty smiles. It could have been a sad scene to witness if not for the irony of cheerful pop songs about love, life and optimism blasting in the audio system. Jin wouldn’t be surprised if he suddenly sees a passing parade in the corridor with dancing clowns leading the way, throwing paper daisies and confetti everywhere, followed by a marching band and a hearse.

Jin feels like whistling.

 ***

The hallway across the dining hall hosts a wall of memorabilia collected with great care over the years – framed album and single covers, posters after posters of hairstyles far more outrageous than the last. It’s a wall painstakingly done and updated, detailed to the last sequin. There are thousands of smiles and millions of unfamiliar faces. It’s a wall of endless stories.

It is where Jin sees Junko.

“We look ridiculous.” He comments at one particular poster, his voice loud enough for her to hear even if she’s few feet away. He flings his jacket over his shoulder and glances at her – a show of indifference, something he is never good at.

Junko blinks at him, a bit startled, and bows. “…it’s interesting.”

"You’re polite. Your mother raised you well.” Jin laughs. “How is she by the way?”

“Healthy as a horse. Still the life of every party.”

Jin smiles to himself. “She’s always been the happy one.”

Junko seems to not hear him as her attention is back to the posters.

Jin then sees a ghost of a toddler running around the very same busy corridor, she stumbles down, she’s crying, and Takako – the young Takako he last saw many, _many_ years ago – comes running, comes to calm down the child, petting the toddler’s hair, whispering words to the child’s ear…

A plate falls on the floor - there’s a loud crash from the dining hall.

Jin breathes.

There’s complete silence for two seconds, the whole place still as an ice… then like a flick of a finger and the place starts buzzing again – people moving, people talking, zombies working, zombies groaning.

Jin breathes. He feels like an idiot.

People are rushing in and out of the dining hall. It’s almost seven now. “More things to do, no time for this, no time, more work, must do”, it’s a chant no one sings.

A group of boys walks out of the cafeteria, laughing loudly and pushing around, rowdy, exuberant. They pass by Jin and the older simply observers them until they disappear around a corner.

“I’m sorry about your father.”

“He had a tumor.” She says after a minute of silence. “He was in pain. It was his time.” Her voice, low and soft rolling like seas crashing over the shores, as it travels over the noise of the dining hall, over the rush of tired personal assistants and managers, dance instructors and vocal coaches. Her hands are gathered in front of her, fingers twisted together, her stature small and unassuming. She looks like a young girl fighting her invisible bully.

Jin nods to himself, his thoughts lost in wander.

Junko glances at him, briefly, and smiles, “But thank you.”

“I never had the chance to meet him but I heard nothing but good things about him.” Jin says but doesn’t look at her.

“He had lived his life full without regrets. We celebrate his life and... try not to mourn his death that much.” Her eyes has gone soft and her smile gone crooked and awkward but seems to be the most truthful he has seen from her.

Jin smiles at a particular NEWS poster from two decades ago. He has his eyes focused and hard, but they’re still quite unseeing. “He’s lucky to have a daughter like you.” He gambles one look at her. “You love him.” He says.

Junko turns to him, eyes lock with his. There are several dozens of poster bearing dreams of a thousand and one young boys hanging between them – one of them his own brand of faded euphoric aspirations. There’s a distance between them and the muted noise around the two of them sounds like a buzzing static of overheard conversations in a foreign city. Jin feels a vague trace of burning pain down his throat like he’s thirsty and about to die.

“He’s the best father I could ever have.”


	7. Interlude ii

Many had come and gone and the key to happiness, as Julie learned from experience, is to lower one’s standard and expectation – a sure way to save you from heartaches, headaches and all other aches.

During the clearest of the nights, when the moon is at its peak of fullness and brightness, Julie wonders.

She plays a scene in her mind – on how he perhaps seen that night and their every, single succeeding encounters, with big and little details (with imaginary and real ones - no one keeps track; it’s a slow game of catch), on what he thinks of her, on what she thinks he thinks of her, on what she thinks….

It’s always him and sometimes her, but it’s always him and the sweet tangy taste he has left on her lips. It’s a never-ending fantasy of could-have-beens and might-have-beens.

It’s a story no one knows.

***

**( - , 1989)**

_“We’ll get you soon, you know. We have plans – all of them big.” He mutters from where he’s slumped across the table, one arm despairingly over his closed eyes. He feels the pulse against the skin in his wrist; it’s faint and erratic but it’s still there and still beating. Good enough. The vibration is oddly relaxing despite everything._

_"Of course, Mr. Yoda.” She says, long fingers calmly gathering the papers in front of her.  The tiny, almost obscured smile on her face is out of place with her tight ponytail, dress suit of endless hard lines and a black mother of pearl that shines spotlessly against the bright fluorescent light. She’s humoring him and it took him a whole five seconds to realize it. Oh the tragedy._

_“The next decade will be ours.” He says, “Even the years after. We’ll be big and powerful and eat you people alive.” He stands and leans towards her, his knuckles white and translucent against the dark mahogany table. He grits, tries to sound intimidating and credible but his voice is raspy and low and he’s quite certain, with a deep blow and twist on his gut, he’s fooling no one. It’s almost 10 in the evening and six months of hard work is down the drain, down the sewerage like a waste, treated exactly like shit._

_She glances at him for a moment – her eyes are bright. She’s reading him and he’s a fool to think or to even consider, but he feels like a caveman, he’d like to bare his war scars, show the men he had beheaded to impress her, or perhaps just to scare her off._

_She smiles at him, so brief it could’ve been all in his head. She resumes sorting the files on a clear folder; Her movements are slow and easy but defined and with a bounce that speaks nothing but confidence._

_There are only two of them left, with the last person closing the door behind him. It’s quiet with just the last traces of the night’s discussion echoing in their ears. The venetian blinds are pulled up and the rising moon is seen over the silhouette of stacked buildings – the very own concrete mountain ranges of urban Tokyo, it would probably look spectacularly revolting when seated next to the scenic Japanese Alps. Even the flashing city lights seem dim and faded against the striking moonlight above._

_She stands to dusts off her pants and when she finally raises her head, she smiles at him, a dot of dimple showing. “We’ll look forward to it then.” And she bows, low and polite – hardly the gesture he expects from her._

_She walks to the door and he rolls his head back. He feels like giving up – c’mon throw in the white towel and pick up your remaining self-worth.  He sighs loudly to the ceiling, eyes unblinking._

_Fuck – no, he will not cry – dammit._

_He rubs his face with his palm and tries to remove the weariness weighing down on him and tries to ignore the frustration swelling in the depths of his stomach. He presses the heel of his hand to his eye and he sees blinding bright stars. His resolve crumbles down and he finally haunches down and covers his face entirely with his hands._

_And then he hears the door opening._

_He peeks between his fingers and sees her pause by the threshold; sees her index finger tapping the knob, like she’s thinking, waiting, weighing something on that pretty head of hers._

_He thinks for half a second, pushes his tongue on the side of his inner cheeks, a surge of blinded confidence fills his veins from his groin to what small chunk of a brain he has left with, completely clouding his better judgment.“Hey, Ms. Fujishima?”_

_When she turns her head back, she still seems to be trying to stop herself from smiling.  Smiling from what exactly is beyond him even years after that night. “Yes, Mr. Yoda?”_

_“Can I at least have your number? My father’s going to kill me. At least let my day end with a pretty girl’s number on my phone.” He winks as an afterthought, you know, for good measure._

_She frowns. She‘s mad, offended definitely, but she’s flushed down to her neck. It’s almost worth it. “Good night, Mr. Yoda. I wish your father’s recording company all the best.” She doesn’t sprint out of the door, doesn’t slam the door. She simply bows again and smiles, a bit more stiff but a smile nonetheless. She walks out with just the silent sound of her stilettos against the floor echoing in the empty room and the hallway outside._

_He sinks down to his chair and exhales, listening to her footsteps until it fades to silence._

_(He would find a calling card left on that mahogany table seven minutes later.)_

***

 She usually wakes up right before the dawn, weak sun peeking through the low-riding clouds.

 


	8. Chapter 8

Their Tokyo home is located in a discreet suburbia in Tama-shi where the streets are narrow, sprawling web-like, where trees are wedged between low-fenced identical square backyards. There are empty pedestrian lanes and streetlamps that never run out of light, that never flicker even years after.

Three bedrooms, one bathroom, 2-car garage and a small flowerbed that never seems to bloom even in the most brilliant springs.

It’s probably the soil, their father would say, offering an unsolicited opinion every single year since Junko can remember. He’d say that, yes he would, with a small disapproving frown as he looks from the living room window.

It’s an old house now but it’s their home and that’s always been enough for Junko.

Her younger brother moved out a year ago, a little after the funeral. He decided to take a break from his accounting course to open a small music lounge with a woman he just met. It’s out of grief, Junko knows. Her brother adores their father like a war hero.

It’s a little lonely now with their father laid peacefully in the quiet hills of his hometown in Hyogo, their mother barely staying in Tokyo for more than a week and her brother on a mournful journey of self-discovery in the wrong path of self-destruction.

She flicks the light switch on and drops her bag on the couch. She walks barefoot in a circle in the middle of the small living room, eyes looking around, studying the bland beige walls, the shelves covered in thick sheets of dust, the darkened kitchen at the end of the room, and the old, creaking stairs.

She kneels in front of the stack of DVDs beside their old TV. Her fingers running over the titles as she whispers the titles to the cold, empty house.

She is about to pull out a battered copy of Rashamon, a favorite of her father’s, when the door opens.

“Hi honey.” Takako sweeps inside, smiling at Junko. Her hair is slightly messy, wind-blown like she just came from the shore. Her mother always seems like a creature of the sea, or the forest perhaps – wild and carefree; she seems to be herself the most when in Hyogo, with the nature near her.

“I’m an Okinawan.” Her mother would say proudly even to people she’d just met, like it’s a fact never to be forgotten.

“You’re home early.” Junko drops the DVD case on the floor as she twists from where she’s sprawled on the floor to follow Takako’s movement around the house.

“Tell me about it! I was supposed to pick up some fabric with your grandma tomorrow –we were thinking of redoing the curtains in the main house. But then the office called! Minoru said they need me at the rehearsal tomorrow. For what, I’m not even sure.” She rants as she goes upstairs, the floorboards creaking quietly against her socked soles. “I’m telling you, they just miss me. They don’t need me – an old woman.” She pauses, maybe to pull out from her sweater-vest, “But then again, I’m pretty charming. So I’m not really sure.” She laughs and the sound booms inside the house.

Junko looks at the ceiling and notes the creaking sound as Takako walks above. Her legs are dying beneath her, numbing with blood unable to circulate, but she remains still on the floor, hands on her lap and eyes staring at the cobwebbed ceiling, tracing the imaginary movement of her mother upstairs.

She loves her mother, like any daughter would. And she tries to see Takako as a woman void of the affection of the public for her and respect from her colleagues, void of that motherly warmth Junko was raised with, void of that musical way she laughs.

_“You’ll always be my daughter.”_

Enou’s voice echoes, and something slips away from Junko.

 


	9. Interlude iii

**_(Summer, 2012)_ **

 

_It’s the third day she’s been here and he has dragged her to places he says are his favorites but she knows he’s bluffing because he doesn’t live here; he’s as an outsider as she is, a mere tourist. She doesn’t say anything and plays along, exactly like what they’ve been doing for years now._

_She hasn’t removed her ring._

_Unsurprisingly, he doesn’t ask her to remove it; his eyes never straying to its direction. She suspects he’s pretending it is he who that ring represents._

_It’s a game, what they have. It could be Tennis – Love, the referee would shout and she wouldn’t argue even if it’s her loss. Game set – it’s coming to end now._

_Last night she stood under the hot shower for hours until her fingers wrinkle – ugly and unfamiliar, and her nails turn purple despite the temperature. She felt him press against her not long after, hot breath on her ear, whispering lovely,_ lovely _things, his voice musical and familiar. She let herself bask in it, leaning back to him, feeling his feverish hands on her skin – he’s scalding and pulsing and_ alive _and she fights to memorize every second of it…_

_The city is wet like today. There are angry gray clouds low-lying over their head and a thick mist that blankets the busy city and it seems to never vaporize completely. Her clothes feel damp all the time, sticking to her skin like a sweating sheet of film._

_Even when the Sun decides to show up, there’d be sun-showers minutes after. Fat, heavy drops of water from the clear sky._

I hate sun-showers. It’s like the sky is lying.  _She had read a line like that years ago._

_The people they meet on the streets are frowning over their cups of coffee, over their NY Times, pausing only to look condescendingly at the flustered barista or street vendor, pausing only to try to ignore the beggar with the best of their abilities._

_It’s the dark weather, she thinks as they eat their breakfast in a quiet diner down the street from their hotel. He’s doing the crossword beside her; she always questions when he would, teasing him, but he’d just shrug and say it helps his comprehension skills. He’d say that not looking at her, his ears turning a shade of red._

_Their tangled legs are stretched over, their feet propped over the booth seat across them. His coffee is cold now but he likes it better that way, though he’ll never admit it—he thinks it’s a sign of unmanliness and she thinks it’s adorable of him to think so._

_She hums under her breath, leaning on his side. He always smells like an old book, with dog-eared pages and fragile bounded spine, and cigarette, even when he’s drunk and spluttering nonsense, even when he’s freshly showered and ready to leave again._

_He turns to her, “What is it?” He says in English, frowning like a little boy._

_“Nothing.” She says in Japanese, and moves to mouth his jaw._

_He smiles and leans to her._

_“I’m leaving soon.” She doesn’t say._

_“I hope you’ll have a good life.” He doesn’t say but she childishly believes he wishes anyway because – harsh as it might sound – it’s just a game and they’re both a good sport._


	10. Chapter 10

Jin slips inside the hall fifteen minutes before the group comes out. Crossing his arms, he settles at the back corner beside a wide-eyed journalist who keeps on combing his hair back.

The hotel ballroom is packed, as one would expect, but there’s a distinct lack of excitement in the air – it’s heavy, dry and thick like in a mosh pit crowded with people who are in the wrong concert. All are looking disgruntled and bored, like they’re just in it for the free food. Which is probably the case.

It’s only the extended member of entourage that seems to be running around the place with a relative amount of adrenaline in their system. Most of the media people are converging among themselves in small clusters, their stage whisper-discussion of how routinely dull these things have turned out over the years-apparent to everyone in fifty-meter radius. They’d laugh mockingly and would tilt their chins up whenever they’re talking to someone, their neck craning to spy every other person who would walk in and out of the hall. Everyone looks like a bunch of nicely dressed ducks. 

Jin can still remember KAT-TUN’s press conference decades ago with less bitterness than what a whole generation would probably assume.  There’s a tension, of course there was. Never was there an absence of moments of searing hostility among boys of that maturity level; of young men with conflicting dreams and means to achieve it. That day might even have been the climax of that limbo-ride and the years subsequent to that – preceding the group’s irrevocable fall-out years after, was just a free fall, long-standing denouement in some sick zero-gravity empty space.

Taking all that into account, he can still taste the thrill of it all. The idea of “Here I am. I have arrived.” The smug feeling twisting in his gut, like a dozen frost-bitten fingers pulling his insides, flipping it inside-out, caressing the lining of his stomach with fleeting touches – he wanted to scream, loud and proud,  _In your fucking face_ to everyone who said they would never get to that point.

His blood felt hot and boiling under his wrists and the veins he never thought he had thumped against his temple the whole afternoon. He was hyper-sensitive, aroused; it’s the white-hot lust of success. It’s crazy and addicting. It was that exact surge of adrenaline that he had been chasing years after, always desiring to feel that childish ecstasy again.

He knew it wasn’t just him – all of  _them_ were feeling it. It was blinded naivety on their part that made them believe that that from that point on, everything would be better; that things would start falling into their rightful places. They’re kids, of course they believed happily every afters and those pop culture psychology bullshit.

They just forgot; it isn’t just their dream. It’s a business most of all.

But even then, the place was full of quiet affirmation of the awaiting glory and good life for the six of them. The media then was tolerant of the system their agency has.

But years into it, generations had faded and media, or at the very least these lowly foot soldiers here today, has finally gotten tired of the junk the agency has kept on repackaging as brilliant gems.

It’s probably because he was – at one point of his life – one of them that he feels sad. He sympathizes. These kids here have unsoiled dreams of making it big. Corporate and industry anarchy aside, media hostility or not, these are mere children for god’s sake and the least that these sharks could do – the agency people included – is to make this day a memorable one for these kids.

It’s going to be ugly from this point on. Give them their shining moment,  _then_ you eat them.

***

“Mr. Akanishi.” Ken greets, his eyes wide and blinking.

Jin nods at him, acknowledging. 

Ken looks at him for a moment, then back to the clipboard in his hand, “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Sorry. Was I not supposed to…” He trails off with a small frown.

“Oh no, no. It’s not like that at all. It’s fine. We just weren’t expecting any talent to come today.” Ken pauses, watching Jin settle back on the wall. “Did the hound dogs see you?”

Jin laughs, “Doubt it. I’m no Alpo anymore.”

Ken looks at Jin for a moment, and Jin stares back, daring him to respond to that but Ken turns and coughs to himself, “What do you think of Mr. Yamashita’s son up there?” Ken gestures to the boy talking on the middle of the platform, mic in hand and smiling brightly for the cameras.

“He shouldn’t have.” Jin says.

Ken nods, understanding; he faces the platform again but remains unmoving near Jin.

“Julie sent you, didn’t she?” Jin asks quietly, amused. “Corporate Service does not bother with this side of the business.”

Ken smiles to himself, soft and almost unseen, like a little secret. “She did. She hates this new unit. She said, ‘Today, you’re a ninja Mr. Hiromichi.’”

Jin laughs at that louder than he would’ve liked. Ken smirks, going back to his clipboard, writing something. “Lovely woman, is she not.” He hums quietly.

The press conference is drawing to a close just barely twenty minutes into it. There’s really not a lot to ask barely-known pubescent boys.

And Katsu has been hogging the mic and that smile isn’t fooling anyone, not in this day and age.

_“I have the best role model to look up to. My father is my best friend.”_ Camera flashes.

Jin notes the side-along glances of the four other boys on the stage. Shaking his head, Jin feels second-hand embarrassment coming on. Poor kid. If Jin doesn’t know any better, he’d think this is just a dare between Pi and the other guys – whose kid will make it big?

“They’re not signing them to any of the in-house recording units.” Ken says, keeping his voice low, going for nonchalance but Jin knows better.

Most of the people are in front of the platform now, eager to get a picture, clamoring to ask a question, to record that smile that will dictate singles ranking for the next five years, regretfully so.

The other half of the room is occupied by just a handful of people: Jin and Ken in one corner, one agency VP dropping by and his assistant – a big-boned woman with a small face, demurely on her toes whispering in the VP’s ears, all the while her eyes darting around the hall like a hawk. There’s another woman few steps away from them with a NEWS TODAY lanyard, talking animatedly on the phone, and ignoring everything around her, and lastly, a lone hotel staff, clearing the buffet table.

“A new recording company for them? That’s not unheard of. J-Storm and J-one started as a daycare center as well.”

Ken doesn’t look at him. “They’re signing them to another recording company. Universal.”

Jin hums. That’s been done before as well. In fact, lately most of the groups – “Oh.”

Ken glances at him before watching the new unit pose in front of the cameras, victory sign and all the shebang.

“Rumor has it, by Q3 next year all the three remaining, functional recording units will cease operations. They’ll just let it roll for one more fiscal cycle then they’re calling it quits. Officially, that is.”

“Downsizing” Jin says more to himself.

“Miss Julie has set a month-end deadline for the liquidation reports of all the ceased subsidiaries for the last five years. Account receivables were last month. She still doesn’t get the whole picture – she thinks proper third party audit can still pick up the mess. That’s why she’s insisting on a settlement with the royalty issue with your group.”

“What exactly are you going at, kid?”

Ken looks at him, slightly alarmed, shaking his head, “No. Not like that. I’m just saying –”

“She has every right to invoke godly fury to the current management. From what I’ve heard, Ishikawa and Cooper had been in it for almost four years before they’re caught.”

The crowd is dispersing now and people with blank faces in bespoke suits are ushering the group inside the back room. Jin laughs at the scene and Ken looks at him bewilderingly. The agency is living up to their almost a century-old image. The handlers are now dressed to nines, like a little army of  _capodecina_ ready to kill for the boss. 

“How long have you been working for Julie, son?”

“Almost two years, sir.”

Jin stays quiet for a minute, his face unmoving. “Johnny’s is a small company. More than half of the employees are contractual and project-based. But same people have been running this place for the last decades – only now with theirs sons and daughters. The scale of treachery Cooper did wasn’t something that would go unnoticed for that long without help.”

Ken shifts in his weight, “It was industry-wide. But Johnny’s was the one affected the most. Avex lost a couple of millions as well, from what I’ve heard.”

Jin chuckles darkly and Ken stares at him. “Avex.” Jin says, wonderment thick in his voice. “Have you learned anything about Julie for the two years you’ve been working for her?”

“A lot about dialysis I can assure you.”

Jin hums, arms still crossed at his chest, fingers drumming his arm. “Avex and Julie. They have a history.” He drawls slowly, like he’s forcing it out. “When I was just starting out it ran around like an urban legend, like the type of story you’d tell children so they’ll eat their vegetables.”

“She hates Avex?”

Jin laughs again. “No. I don’t think so. Far from it.” Jin says and his tone doesn’t allow for further questions.

But Ken has that hardened, determined look in his eyes, “Avex is planning a buyout.”

Jin remains silent so Ken continues, “It was Uehara Takako and Enou Hamada’s daughter that came and cautioned us about the plan. You were there when she dropped by Miss Julie’s office unexpectedly”

Jin nods, his mouth forming a thin line but the rest of his face remains unfazed.

Ken takes a deep breath and busies his hands with his clipboard. “As much as it hurts the upper management’s pride, they are considering. It’s the easy way out. ”

“And Julie?”

“Absolutely livid.” And Ken breaks into a big, maniacal smile. “She’s pushing everyone and willing everything she can do in her power to save what is left and avoid the buyout. She said she’ll die trying.”

Jin scowls at that and shifts his weight and uncrosses his arms. “And you? What’s your say in all of these?” He drawls out, his voice testing.

Ken looks back at him. “Not that what I say matters but the buyout is the best move we can do at this rate.”

“At this rate he says.” Jin clicks his tongue, murmuring. “I wonder if that’s really the case.”

“We don’t really have the luxury to know any better. They’re –,” Ken coughs, “We’re running out of options.”

Jin exhales loudly, “And it’s a real shame.” He says but he’s smiling to himself, barely paying attention to Ken. “It is. But it’s not really up to Julie anymore. The upper management knows what they are doing and you said it yourself, it’s not only the easy way out but also the best way to get through this mess. Julie, bless her, is blinded with misguided optimism.”

Jin looks at Ken, eyes boring on him, still with that testing tone – daring him to argue otherwise.   

Ken shrugs dismissively and Jin huffs in response. As Ken turns his attention back to the stage, Jin spies him from the corner of his eye.

“I like you kid.” Jin says to him. “You here from Tokyo?”

“No, sir. I just moved here after college graduation from a small town few hours from Kobe.”

Jin nods, taking the information slowly, his eyes crinkling at the edges, smirking vaguely to himself. “You seem like a good kid. I guess you could get yourself a decent job in a quiet small town. Why bother with all this crap?” Jin asks at length, but his eyes are blankly staring at the empty stage, or the wall probably, and the question seems to hang above them like a silent time bomb.

“One should always see the world once given a chance. Wouldn’t you agree, Mr. Akanishi?” Ken answers, quietly and unassuming.

Jin laughs weakly. “I suppose.” He says and he’s smiling, his eyes glassy with something darker than humor

Jin moves to stand straight and stretches his arms upward, the lithe muscles on his arms silhouetted on his white shirt tremble a bit due to the lack of movement for a long time. He uncuffs his sleeves with a flick of a finger and rolls them to his elbows. His skin is pale against the bright afternoon sun from the large drape-less cathedral windows of the hall. The skin on his wrist is transparent enough to see the overlapping intricate long lines of green and purple veins underneath it.

Ken looks at him unabashedly as Jin fixes his collar and gathers his jacket, settling it in the crook of his elbow. Jin massages his hands, moving from his palms to his calloused fingers, cracking one at a time.

Ken observes that Jin is probably counting in his head, like there’s a beat to follow in his every moment. He’d say Jin is hard at the edges, his movement heavy and restless, but there’s an obvious coordination every time he’d lift a finger or even blink. He’s almost like a former ballet dance, who abhors the rigid exercises and maddening self-discipline it requires, but his own body hasn’t forgetten the forms and beat that ballet has engraved to his system.

“You think these boys would sell?” Jin asks as he rolls his shoulders.

“There’s no reason they shouldn’t.”

Jin laughs again, but it’s shallow and loud. “There’s a lot of reason, boy.”

Ken looks at him but doesn’t say anything. Jin is standing there, at the back of a no-name hotel hall, and not a single media person has noticed him. He’s standing straight, but his frame is lean, bordering on thin, and his eyes are weary, the skin around his eyes wrinkly with age. There’s a small scar seen on his collarbone, just before it disappear under his shirt.

There are thousands of stories about Jin now, few of those are about that scar on his collarbone, his heart attack in Acapulco, the night he spent in a subway station, his collection of coffee mugs in his duplex home in New York, the woman he met at a friend’s wedding 20 years ago – and all of these are testament to the passing of time and the result of it – a changed man from the kid he was a lifetime ago in a press conference just like this one today. 

“Piece of advice, son.” Jin starts, his dark eyes boring on him. “Do your job and let others do theirs. And stick with Julie.” Jin says and claps Ken’s shoulders. He strays one last sweeping look at the whole place before walking away.

Ken bows after Jin’s retreating back. When he straightens up again, Jin is already out of the hall. 


	11. Interlude iv

**_(Summer, 2025)_ **

 

_It’s going to rain, he thinks as he studies the clouds._

_Summer is almost over. It’s going to be quiet here again once all the tourists have gone back to their homes. He drags his sneakers against the dry, dirt road and in turn feels the small pebbles inside his shoes with his every step. There’s an inch-thick of sand sticking on the bottom of his soles but he doesn’t think of it._

_The wind is picking up now, and the clouds are moving fast above, running like they can’t wait to get away from this place. Like everyone else._

_The air smells exactly like sea and fish and it’s almost foul if not for the fact he was born and raised in this seaside town and had years to get used to this stench. This is home. Home, where the air is always thick, sometimes dry, sometimes wet, but always smelling like saltwater and freshly cut grass._

_He never seems to rid the taste of salt on his tongue. It is always there, the salty taste of home._

_He goes down a rocky hill, inching away from the sandy slopes, before landing in a patch of willowy beach grass. He grabs a fistful of the taller grass and yanks some of it. He opens his palms and stares as the wind blows them away from him._

_He settles in a relatively flat surface of the hill, few feet away from another shallow cliff. He likes the view here – the sea infinitely stretching before him, perfectly still as it would before a storm, and all he can see are few fishing boats afloat and a deserted beach void of the usual souvenir stores, void of rowdy backpackers, void of the city’s mess._

_He was nine the first time his cousin brought him here. Since then they’d spend their summers spying the tourists that would accidentally stumble in this part of the beach. They would scare them with loud growling sounds like they’re some sea monsters or revengeful ghosts of the seas._

_The rocky plane is tucked in the edge of the side of the hill, and hidden obscurely by the tall beach grass. No one comes here anymore. His cousin moved out years before._

_“To see the world outside this town, boy; a place far from the sea, no mountains, no hills, but flat cemented road, endless asphalt roads, vending machines and bright lights during the nights.” His cousin once said to him, smiling madly, like he’s in love with someone._

_Few, small boats are anchored on the deck down the shore and no people are in sight. He spies the net secured inside the boats and he thinks it’s almost off-season for the fishermen as well. The colder months are the cruelest to them._

_He skids further down the slope and he feels the sand on the sole of sneakers trickle away, leaving him with the rough slope digging hard against his thinning soles._

_He zips his jacket up and covers his head with the hood as he steps on the empty beach._

_He loiters along the shoreline, leaving sneaker-prints in the wet sand, only for the waves to wash it away seconds after. He picks up some twigs and throws them at the sea, the flick of his wrist says years of routine. At one point he sits on his heels and doodles on the sand a caricature of a woman with big breasts. He stands and watches the waves wash away the smiling face of the strange woman on the sand._

_Walking down the empty deck, he inhales through his nose and breathes out through his mouth. His body eases with the sound of the rolling waves crashing on the shore. He leans over the railing and stares at the waters below but he can’t see his reflection. The water is black and the cloud above is graying. He debates with himself whether this is a good idea or not until he hears trudging footsteps._

_“Hi.” She says._

_“Hey.” He says._

_The kid is wearing pants and a jacket and her hair is pulled back in a bun. She also has a small backpack. The kid is going back to the city, today._

_“You’re here.” She says, breathlessly. “We’re going home today. I just want to look at the sea before we go.” She smiles that smile that doesn’t imply anything. It’s polite and she’s doing that just because. She’s saying that just because._

_“Yeah?” He says anyway._

_She smiles at him again, this time unsurely and she waits. He looks at her. She’s small and pale, but her eyes are wide and dark._

_“Yeah.” She says and rests her arms on the railing beside him. She barely reaches his shoulder._

_They don’t talk for a while, both watching the dark sea, probably waiting for something he doesn’t know._

_“What’s that?” She asks, gesturing at the small book tucked in his jeans’ back pocket._

_He hands it to her wordlessly, “The Setting Sun. Summer homework.”_

_“Is it good?” She asks, flipping the pages of the thin paperback._

_He ducks his head, “Haven’t read it actually.”_

_She looks at him for a moment, wide-eyed before laughing, wildly, like he’s_ that _fascinating. “School is about to start! You’re impossible!” She says but he’s not sure if she’s scolding him or she’s amused. Or both. He’s feeling rather pleasant._

“I get by.” He says cheekily and bumps her with his shoulder, bending his knees to meet her. It’s an effort to do but he always does it anyway.

_She laughs again, slapping the book back into his hand._

_“Hey. Jun-_ na _? You’ll be back next year? Yeah?” He finally says._

_“Of course.” She answers but she isn’t looking at him. It is starting to drizzle and he thinks this is where they should be going now, should run to that shed on the other end of the deck. He thinks and considers, then he feels so very stupid._

_“Drats. I have to go now.” She says and she’s frowning at the sky. She has her hands covering her head. She turns to him, “I’ll see you next year, Ken.” She smiles at him that same smile that makes him feel stupid and silly and weak._

_“Yeah. Next year.” Is all he says and she runs off the deck. He doesn’t watch her climb into the waiting car on the road that’ll drive her back home, far from the sea and the mountain. Free of fake sea monsters and revengeful ghosts of the seas. Wherever that place is._

_He stays in the deck and waits for the first rain of the season but it never comes. The Sun breaks out of the heavy, dark clouds a little while later and the beach is impossibly bright again._

_Forever summer, he thinks, and then he laughs, loud and crazy, throwing his head back and letting his smiling face bask in the sunlight._

 


	12. Chapter 12

 

This time the exhibit is held in a basement of a nondescript building in Koto, where people sleep over reclaimed lands, where the houses are built for the worse, its foundation sturdier than most. On his way, Jin sees a graffiti’d firewall – _Everything belongs somewhere_ , it says in broad strokes of yellow on black.

There is less champagne and more oil in canvass with questionable moral bearing. People, a great number of them in khakis and oxfords, are milling in and out of the place and the small room at the back reeks of something smoky and illegal. Jin coughs as he passes by the door, praying that this is indeed a lowbrow charity event and not some co-ed party he unintentionally crashed.

“Now, that’s one ugly-looking couple.” Jin greets, striding covertly at their side.

Maru laughs at him. Hitoe flips the bird.

They’re holding hands and both in jeans, looking the odd-ones out among the generally younger crowd but they’re grinning madly, lazily like they don’t care.

They look homey.

“No, seriously. You do.” Jin says.

“It’s okay. He’s a lonely old man.” Maru tells Hitoe and she actually giggles.

“Jesus!” Jin laughs, “For real? Since when?”

“For a while now.” Hitoe hums at him.

“Huh,” He pauses, “Well, that’s disgusting.” Jin blanches, in which Hitoe answers with a graceless snort and eye roll. Maru simply beams at them, his eyes wrinkling in amusement.

Jin breaks into a grin, but not without sighing in fake exasperation, “But don’t let my truthful disapproval deter you young folks.”

“Your pitiable attempt to verbally offend me leaves little to be desired, Akanishi.” Hitoe sighs long-sufferingly. “I’ll see you both later. I have to go mother these preppy potheads.” Jin sees her squeezing Maru’s hands before walking away.

“That was a surprising turn of event.” Jin mutters as they watch her disappears into the crowd. “Last time I checked she doesn’t even know your last name.”

Maru smiles, but his eyes have gone darker, hooded by shadows that weren’t there just a while ago. He has his hair in pomade, clashing with his white dress-shirt and jeans. He looks younger than the last time Jin saw him.

“You think we’re too old for this?” Maru asks, his voice low and smile rather rueful this time.

“Could be. But who am I to say.” Jin says.

He studies Maru from the corner of his eye as the other further plunges in what seems a tangle of conflicting thoughts, with his eyes having that faraway depth.

Jin wrinkles his nose and distractedly touches the scar in his collarbone. “But as long as you’re happy… and all that shit.” Jin says.

Maru nods at that, slowly. And suddenly Maru is middle-aged again, worn out and almost weary, and unmoving at his side. Jin closes his eyes. He can hear Maru’s thoughts swarming in the air, in waves identical to his. They’re thinking loudly, debating, reconciling, and telling excuses after excuses.

We’re foolish, Jin thinks. They’re supposed to be not like this. They’re supposed to be better at this. Jin feels wretched, drained to his bones, like the first day he was back in Japan. He felt alienated by everything that day – the weather, the people,  _everything_ , even now and he’s missing out on a lot, the essence of this all, doesn’t get it anymore, doesn’t remember why he’s even bothering.

He opens his eyes and stares at the far wall.

This isn’t working out anymore like it’s supposed to.

Jin half-laughs half-sighs to himself and to everything and everyone because –

And perhaps, it’s time he admits it.

He slings at arm around Maru, “Hey. C’mon, happy and all that shit.” Jin repeats anyway.

Maru gives in and breathes out, like he’s drawing energy back in his rusty system, “Right,” He says, smiling, and his tone vague and distant, “Happy and all that shit.”

Jin squeezes Maru’s shoulder and ignores his heart plummeting down his throat, throbbing; and simply waits for that feeling to subside.

***

 Jin is almost out of the door and all decided to call it a night when he spots Junko with a yuppie-looking crowd at the other end of the room. Junko sees him and he waves at her in recognition briefly, politely and is about to leave it like that but Junko swiftly excuses herself from the group and hurries off to Jin’s direction before he can even figure out why she would.

“Mr. Akanishi.” She bows at him and Jin frowns, but doesn’t let it show.

“Nice to see you again, Ms. Hamada.”

“Small world.” She says smiling. Her eyes are stilted, and her jaw is hard and unmoving, her features schooled to look neutral, or perhaps even pleasant.

“I guess Hitoe invited you – oh, is your mother here?” Jin blinks, cranking his neck as he scans the whole place with a somewhat truant attention.

“No. She’s not in town at the moment.”

“Ah.” Jin nods, once, “Would have loved to see your mother again. It’s been years.”

He doesn’t know what he’s excepting but it’s definitely not Junko staring at him, looking partly confused, sad, miserable and –

“Is something the matter?”

Junko then gathers herself again, slowly like she’s picking herself from the floor, piece by piece and it’s a task that’s excruciating to do.

“Can we,” She grimaces, like the words she’s about to say is burning her from the inside, and Jin breathes through his nose because that twist in his gut is all too familiar, it’s dread and uncertainty and he knows he should walk out from this, he knows but –

“Can we talk outside – that is if you’re not off to –  _Oh_ I’m sorry, were you about to go?” She looks at him wide-eyed and panic all over her face – she’s so young and blood-drained and pale and something kicks inside Jin, a stalled, long-forgotten engine suddenly revving up, wheels turning.

“It’s fine. It’s fine.” 

Junko smiles, slowly, unsurely and it’s breaking her, he knows – and he doesn’t even have the energy to wonder why he  _knows_ . “I’m sorry. It’s nothing. Never mind.”

Jin looks at her for a long moment.

“Come. Walk me to my car.”

***

It’s a busy night even for a city like this. Some kids are hanging out by the curb and the smoke of their reds and menthols disperses slowly and hazy through the night sky, covering their faces and shadows like they’re mere dim illusions of the night.

Junko seems relaxed the whole time they’re in the corridor and as they climbed down the stairs, asking polite questions about his health, art and his friendship with Hitoe, in which Jin laughs at, “We’re not exactly friends. We just know each other because of your mum.”

Junko blinks.

“What is it, Ms. Hamada?” He asks again as he sees something flash in Junko’s eyes.

Junko hesitates for a split second, and that pained burnt look is back on her face. When she finally looks at him, she does it straight to the eyes, piercing likes she’s reading him.

“When was the last time you saw or talked to my mother?” She asks softly but with a silent blow of a weighted accusation.

Jin frowns, taken a back. “Probably even before you’re born. Years ago. What is this all about?”

Junko lets out a shaky breath before closing her eyes. Jin waits.

“Before my… my father died, he said something and I… I could be wrong. I could be – I’m probably being presumptuous but he said,” She pauses and breathes, “He said I’ll always be his daughter and I don’t know what to make of that…” She says finally, looking at him, eyes half-lidded, and voice edgy.

Jin shuts his eyes.

“And I know.” Junko hastily adds, whispering, “I  _know_ about New York. A month before they got married, mum ran off to New York. She’d usually joke about it, cold feet she’d say. I…” She’s still looking at him, imploringly and she’s out of it, helpless.

The kids at the curb are talking loudly, jeering at each other and there are sounds of tin cans being stomped over, and shrieks of laughter – that type of laughter that comes from the depth of one’s gut, like you’d burst out if you don’t let go and your shoulder would shudder out of happiness and delight; the type which makes you relive the moment and temporarily let go of your worries and let tomorrow figure out itself.

“Have you talked… to your mother about this already? Does she  _know_ ?”

“No.”

“Why?” He asks. “Ms. Hamada, I don’t know. I –“

Junko closes his eyes and shakes her head, cutting him off, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” She murmurs, her stonewalled façade slowly weakening.

Jin pinches the bridge of his nose, breathes and tries to think of other things, anything. Just, not this.

“I just assumed. I’m sorry – it’s just that, it’s… this is dreadful…  – ah, no, not you, I mean not you – I… I  _love_ him. And my mum –” There’s a hitch in her tone that might indicate she’s about to break, and honestly, Jin doesn’t really need this right now.

He reaches and cautiously touches her shoulder, “Hey. Hey. It’s alright. I don’t know. I really don’t. It’s been  _years_ . I haven’t heard anything about your mother since then. I – ” He trails off because, what.

That doesn’t make any difference, does it?


	13. Chapter 13

 

Ken is standing idly by the glass window on the corridor, staring at the dark-sky muddled lights of Tokyo Sky Tree at the far distance. With a small cup and a mug in each hand, he stays there, a little lost in his world, his lips apart for not more than a centimeter.

“Boy? Boy?” He hears her from down the hallway.

Perhaps that raspy voice is warm and unthreatening during daytime, when you can see her face come alive, breathing with every uttered word, whether – even if – she’s mad, patronizing, demanding or possibly, just subtly concerned and motherly despite her best effort to appear not to be such.

But now that the office has closed for the day, with the moon rising high above the Babylon-like Tokyo cityscape – and the moonlight still brighter, purer than any Skyscraper illumination mankind would ever dream to create – and the hallway before him is endlessly dark and still, her voice, that familiar raspy voice, is thundering in his ears, similar to how Death would whisper to you when you least expect him at your darkest hour.

Ken walks back to the hallway, down the small corner office.  

“Tea, Ms. Julie.” Ken places a teacup on the table and draws back, leaning on the doorframe. He observes her as she sips her tea, her eyes not moving from the computer screen.

“Are you sure you still don’t want to call it a night?”

“Nonsense.” She waves him off, peering above her glasses. Her graying hair frames her face, hooding her wrinkled features with dark-blue shadows. “I’ll be out for the rest of the month. These reports will not write themselves. You on the other hand –?” She trails off, her brows raised.

“Will be staying here because there’s nothing more enjoyable than spending the night at the office studying about common stock regulations. I’m a workaholic ass. My mother will be ecstatic. ” He smiles at her.

She snorts in her tea, “God bless your mother.”

He laughs and walks out of the door. He then drapes his jacket on the back of his chair and stands there, blankly staring at the screensaver of his monitor, his back haunch at an odd angle, a position terrible for his aching back muscles.

“Go home, Mr. Hiromichi. Not that I don’t appreciate you, honey, but you are highly incompetent when it’s past your bed time.” Julie yells from inside the room.

He chuckles to himself as he lazily stretches his arm above his head. “Noted, Miss Julie. Thank you for your concern.” He yells back.

He glances out the window, and he sighs tepidly at the sight – a dully-shadowed building obscuring the could-have-been brilliant view of their restless city.

Sipping his coffee, he pulls his chair and readies for a long night of IPO review.

 


	14. Interlude v

**_(-, 1992)_ **

 

 _“_ Did you get it? _”_

_She removes her glasses and leans back, the leather seat squeaking under her weight. “How did you even get this number?” She asks lightly, her voice liquid warm._

_She hears him laugh over the line – the crisp, low laugh that never fails to make her smile. “_ You give me such little credit. _” He says._

_“On the contrary,” She pauses.” And you know that.”_

_“_ Oh _,_ I do know.”

_In the half-darkness of her office, the silence echoes._

_“But yes,” She says a bit loudly and distractingly, “I got it. Thank you.”_

_He hums, and she can practically see him smiling, “_ I knew you’d love such an odd thing. _”_

_She touches her black mother of pearl earring on her left ear, toying with it, noting how light it weighs on her, and how smooth the surface is. She loves its simple elegance. It’s a gift from her mother. Mary used to say the pearl is the queen of gems and the gem of the queens._

_She waits for her heart to beat still, hoping secretly it’ll tire itself dead._

_“When did you get back?” She asks, breaking the silence._

_Never it be said she’s not an excellent conversationalist, or rather conniving in the arts of steering small talks (knuckling-down and under, both at the same time and subtly– she would calmly reason out if asked), despite her flaws as obvious as daylight._

_“_ I’m huddled inside the far left cubicle of one of Narita’s comfort rooms. _”_

_She closes her eyes, “Mr. Yo – Hiro.”_

_“_ You were lovely in the wedding. _”_

_“Don’t do this.” She says, softly. “C’mon now.”_

_He doesn’t say anything for a moment and all she can hear is his quiet breathing over the phone. “Hiro? Are you still there?”_

_“_ Yeah. Yeah. Look… I’m… sorry. _” He whispers._

Slowly, she pushes herself forward, bends down and buries her face on her folded arm.

_He laughs, lightly, weakly and she feels a dull ache in her guts. “_ Hey, you’re still in the office, aren’t you? _”_

_“Am I that predictable?” She answers, then she pauses, “Oh Hiro –“_

_“_ Yes, you are. You – Shit, I don’t even know why I’m bothering, do you know that – God. Fuck. _”_

_She plants her cheeks against her cold table and looks straight at the blank wall. “I’m sorry.”_

_“_ No. No. This is stupid, you know. I – I’m...I just got back from my own fucking honeymoon.”

_She closes her eyes and desperately imagines their separate bright futures._

_“_ I – I’m sorry. I really am.”  _He says and there’s a long pause. “_ I should go.”  _But_ _he doesn’t hang up._

_“Hiro –”_

_“_ I… I’ll wait for you. I – _” She hears him stutter, it’s faint but it’s there._ “I know that – this is stupid, I know. I know, but. _Christ._ Just say it, just –”

_“No. No, c’mon now. Don’t do that. We’re over. You know I can’t – ”_

_“_ You won’t.”  _He cuts her, and she can hear his resolve breaking. It’s a loud tumble and crash of everything they’ve both dreamed of, when they were still together and strong as an ice._  “Not that you can’t, but it’s because won’t. You choose not to. Fuck you. Fuck  _you_ , Julie. _” He whispers, and his tone – definitive and unwavering. This is the man she knows, the aching familiarity of the man she loves._

_And she – and she breathes, deep._

_“Enough, Mr. Yoda.” She says but she has the heel of her palm hard against one eye. She sees stars behind her one eye; the other is open and is blurry with unshed tears. “Enough. Just, please. Let’s not do this.”_

_There’s an intake of air on the other side of the line, “Yes. I’m sorry.”_

_Julie smiles empty, smiles at no one as she sits here in the middle of her half-dark office. “Thank you for the metronome, Mr. Yoda. It was lovely. Congratulations on your wedding again and on the success of Avex Trax. I hope to see you again.”_

_He laughs for a moment, hysterically and she can hear it echoe from where he is._

_There is dead silence. “It was all my pleasure, Ms. Fujishima. Good night.” He says before hanging up._

 


	15. Chapter 15

 

He sees her almost immediately. There aren’t that much people in the portside today even with this pleasant mid-fall weather. Unpredictably, despite its commercialized exterior, Yokohama Port has its rare quiet moments like this.

She’s talking to a group of women by the railing in the deck. Chances are they are fans. But the way she leans on their direction, almost invading their personal space, and how easy she smiles at them, one could almost feel the years of personal relationship she has with these women.

She gained weight over the years, her face slightly more plump than what he’d remembered. The skin around her eyes is slack and wrinkly, and Jin feels this strange pang at how her eyes squint in thin black arcs whenever she smiles. But despite it all, she’s still the woman he can remember: definitely older but still breathlessly beautiful, and that is all there is.

***

He stands at a distance, watching them and quite uncertain on what to do. It’s been years and he has actually forgotten how unreal she can be at times.

But sure enough she catches him watching. Always with that unnerving sixth sense of hers. Takako breaks in a huge smile and quickly excuses herself  from the group of women and hurries off to him.

“You don’t look a day over twenty-eight.” She greets him the moment she’s in hearing range.

“I wish I could say the same thing to you.” Jin replies pokerfaced.

She looks at him from head to toe and  _tuts_ . “Hitoe is right. You’re still quite the asshole.”

“Hello.” He cannot stop but laugh himself silly as he hands her the long stem rose he’s been hiding behind his back.

She looks at him in the eyes for a moment and sighs exaggeratedly, “You do not deceive me, Akanishi. You are still an asshole.” But she still takes the rose, “Careful, Jin. I’m a vulnerable widow.” And she  _actually_ winks at him.

Jin basks in that familiar warmth and yes, in that moment, he doesn’t feel he’s a day over twenty-eight.

***

Jin places a cup of coffee in front of Takako and she rewards him with a secretive smile.

“Thank you for meeting me despite the short notice.” Jin starts and he aims an intentional self-conscious smile.

But Takako has of course easily read him and snorts. “You know very well, I’ll drop everything after just a call from you.”

Jin chuckles, brows raised, “Oh, is that so?”

Takako considers for a minutes, “Yes so, Mister.” She replies and there’s a known twinkle in her eyes. 

“Well, thank you anyway.” Jin says and Takako nods at him, dismissively.

“Hitoe did mention bumping into you but I honestly didn’t think you’ll call me up. And I’m glad you did. But is there anything you wanted from me?”

Takako tries to look charmingly nonchalant and Jin can also read through her. There’s a slight panic and concern hidden in her voice.

“I’ve met your daughter. Junko.”

“Oh, did you now?”

“I did and your daughter, she has interesting things to say.” Jin offers, his voice quiet. He blows over his coffee before taking a small sip.

“You always let your coffee sit for a few minutes.” Takako says softly.

Jin raises his head to look at her. “Sorry?”

“Your coffee.” She gestures at his cup. “You always burned your tongue when you drink hot beverages.”

“Things change I suppose.” Jin says and to make a point – he takes a sip.

Takako hums at that, amused, but she drops her argument with a small knowing smile. “What were you saying about my Junko?”

“She says I’m her father.”

Takako laughs – she laughs so loudly and ungainly and ungraceful and Jin has never seen anything so raw and beautiful and achingly real like that for quite some time and it left Jin simply bewitched once again.

“I see that you find this amusing.”

“How did she even come up with that idea?” Takako asks as the laughter dies out.

“She knows about New York.”

Takako’s face fell but just a little. “I told her. It has always been a hit with her and her brother. Right before her wedding, their Mommy had her wild adventures in Manhattan! ”

Jin looks at her. “She believes that your husband is not her father.”

“That’s ridiculous.” Takako spats and her voice louder and higher.

“I thought so too. But – ”

“That is complete nonsense, Jin. There is simply no  _buts_ .” Takako says firmly. “Enou is Junko’s father.”

Jin blinks at that, puzzled on why he suddenly feels weakened.  In retrospect, he hasn’t exactly figured out his expectation from this meeting. There’s a slow burn of pain in his chest and he’s praying he’s not having some sort of mild stroke right now.

There is silence in their table but the waves are crashing loudly against the seawall and seagulls are going on their way – doing what seagulls do –  and the dozens of faceless people are basking in the afternoon sun, chatting idly…. It could have been awkward but they’ve been here before and been through much worse than this.

“How is your wife?” Takako asks, smoothly cutting through the bearable tension. She’s always been the professional conversationalist.

“Good? I think.” He pauses. “I’m not sure.” Jin then exhales, “She filed for a divorce earlier this year.”

Predictably enough, Takako gasps. Perhaps because she’s unable to form a proper response, she covers Jin’s hands with hers, combing through their fingers together. Jin looks down at their hands, swallows down the strange pang he’s feeling and thinks about the days when their hands looked good together and not as strange as it is right now. The glimmer of Takako’s wedding ring casts such a lovely halo of light, overshadowing the visible tan line in Jin’s ring finger from the absence of his own wedding band.  

He’s starting to feel lighter. It was probably a stroke after all.

“Is this the reason why you’re here in Japan?” She asks quietly.

“I used to think I’m stronger than this, you know.” Jin slowly extracts his fingers from hers. He casually moves back and avoids looking at Takako’s eyes. He takes his coffee cup and finishes it quickly. His tongue is probably burned but he doesn’t allow himself to even flinch from the stinging pain.

“Do you want to talk about this?”

“There is nothing else to say to be honest.” Jin shrugs.

Takoka stares at him. “Jin. I think you need a friend right now, more than ever.”

“At what point in today’s meeting did you decide that  _you_ are the friend that I need right now, more than ever?”

“The moment you come running to me, excited and hopeful for a child that doesn’t exist.”

Jin laughs to himself, unreservedly and delusional.  Takako smiles but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. Jin hates the fact that that hurts more than he’d ever admit. He has convinced himself that he’d go mad sooner or later.

“We never had a child.” Jin breathes and tries to stop his hands from trembling. “She can’t. We tried. Soon after, we just gave up.” He doesn’t know why he’s telling her this now but he’s been tired, too tired for far too long and he wants all of these out of his system.

“It was only recently I learned that it was such huge deal for her. It’s a burden she’s been carrying by herself all these years. I never knew. Her insecurities are slowly killing her from the inside.”

Jin has always felt miserable whenever it dawns on him that he can’t create something perfect and beautiful with his wife.

“Oh Jin.” Takako whispers. There’s pain in her eyes and Jin isn’t sure if it’s any help to see her with such raw emotion right now.

“I had an affair.” Jin then says flatly. He wishes he was a better storyteller than this.  “It was a fling. Nothing serious and incredibly stupid on my part. It was my fault. I admit that, there’s no sense in denying.” Jin studies Takako’s face, looking for any sign of judgment or disgust but he finds none. She’s looking straight at him, gaze unwavering. Perhaps it’s a gesture of understanding or maybe sympathy. Jin, honestly, doesn’t want to know anymore.

“I thought we have worked it out but it keeps coming back. I was stupid to think that that kind of skeleton can easily be forgotten.” Jin notes all the subtle movements of Takako’s fingers, the way she blinks slowly and how she’s itching to touch him. Jin knows all of these and he berates himself for thinking too much of it. 

“One day, we’re good and hopelessly in love and content with what little family we have and then the next day, she’s mad and crazy and cursing and digging up the past.” Jin pauses, smiling. “It’s all very ugly.”

Takako cringes at that. Maybe, Jin thinks, she understands too the constant and realistic threats of imperfections of any relationships. She’s been married so possibly in the past she too had been a willing fool, playing a part she resented for the sake of her relationship and its uncertain future. There’s a very thin and perilous line between madly in love and maddening love.

“We said hurtful things to each other. There were days when I didn’t think it was still worth it. But you know what, I didn’t give up. Why would I? I know… or maybe, I believe that deep down she still loves me. That I’m the only one for her.” Jin pauses, catching Takako’s eyes. “Isn’t that how this works? How marriage should work?”

Takako shakes her head, “Jin…” She whispers, her voice breaking in invisible tears.

“But then, she filed for a divorce.” Jin chokes. “And that was heart-breaking for me. Ironically, I felt betrayed. We both tried to have this life together, to create a miracle…”

“And Junko…my Junko” Takako whispers. “Oh, Jin. I don’t know what to say…”

“There is nothing to say really.” Jin says in unfamiliar confidence. “The prospect of having a daughter exhilarates me – and at the same time kills me. It’s not exactly infidelity but, oh Jesus.”

Jin then laughs, almost sobbing. “I wanted it so badly, Takako. So bad.”

“I know, Jin. Oh Jin. But why are you here? Why aren’t you there, fighting for her, fighting for that miracle of yours?”

After a moment of silence, as he tries to compose himself, painfully picking himself from the million of pieces on the floor, Jin says with a small unassuming voice, “I just need time to myself. To escape, just like you 25 years ago.”

 


	16. Chapter 16

 

There is some misinformed government employee about the policies of corporate royalties and its accompanying tax rates and Ken feels the beginning of a tension headache as he re-reads his email for the third time in under 12 minutes. With a quiet curse, Ken closes his laptop and decides to step out to chain smoke his budding homicidal tendencies away. It’s only ten in the morning and his hands are slightly shaking but he knows better to ignore it. Nerves, as physical indication of unstable emotions, are always best neglected.

Ken absentmindedly greets people as he navigates the corridors. He lets himself fantasize a holiday he hasn’t done in almost 2 years, sighing loudly and quite miserably as he quickly realizes just how much he misses his hometown and his easy life before that doesn’t involve murderous intent to government employees every fortnight.

He takes his time strolling his way to what he’d like to think is his private smoking area. Few people go to that area at the back of their building as most employees would rather take their 15 minute break in the combini across the street. A quick nicotine dose mixes rather perfectly with caffeine and food. Their stomachs are empty and their brains are working overtime and whatever is left from their dreary souls long for the material needs of its existence. It’s a case of undignified crash and burn waiting to happen for every single one of them.

But Ken enjoys his solitude, which is why this smoking area is the perfect escape. It is smacked right before the open back parking space and there used to be a vacant lot in front of the parking lot and in good days before, you could almost see Mount Fuji. But in the past year, a five-story commercial establishment was built on the lot.  Presently half of the building is still unoccupied and Ken often stares at the dark windows on the 3 rd and 4 th floors, almost like he’s waiting from someone to appear.

But as Ken opens the back door, slowly emerging from his stupor, he stops dead on his tracks. He groans inwardly and considers quietly backing his steps inside the building…

But Chairman Hirai has politely smiled at him and it will probably be terribly inappropriate now to dash out of the vicinity.

“Good day, sir.” Ken calls from where he stands in the corner, with absolutely no intention of getting near the company president. The Chairman looks a bit rumpled, with his button-down shirt tucked messily in his dress pants and with those prominent dark circles under his eyes. He’s slouching and Ken notes the protruding collarbone. He looks like he aged prematurely overnight.

It’s not just Chairman Hirai. Everyone has been under a lot of pressure lately. The production people are pulling all nighters, aspiring to create the world’s most amazing PVs, concerts and albums featuring the world’s most perfect idols with the most blinding smiles and coiffed hair; the corporate services and executives are driving themselves half-mad, pulling strings and just stopping a mere hair strand away from murder, bribing and extortion – and all these blooded efforts to get their humble talent agency back on its feet again and live its legacy of large profit margin, mechanically perfect performances and gray-area business values.

It would never be the same again and most of the time, they all wonder why they even try but deep down somehow they acutely know that this is the least they can do to soften the blow of that inevitable crash and burn.

“It’s Hirmochi, right?”

Ken wills his trembling hands to light himself a cigarette. “Hiromichi Ken.”

Chairman Hirai nods, beckoning him to come near. “We have a great weather today.”

If they’re going to start this small talk with weather commentaries, then Ken better prepare himself for the most painfully trite conversation he’ll ever have the chance of taking part in.

“Yes, I suppose.” Ken answers and with a quick-second internal struggle, he decides to walk up to the Chairman and tries to do better at this small talk business.

“Do you like working here?” Chairman asks him.

Ken doesn’t waste a breath, “It’s an honor working for Miss Julie.”

“Glad to hear that.” Chairman Hirai replies, choosing to ignore the implications of Ken’s wording “We’ll keep you.”

Ken chokes on his inhaled smoke, “Sir?”

Chairman shuts his eyes close, looking absolutely wretched.  “We’re letting people go by next year.” He gives a lopsided smile at Ken, “But don’t you worry, son. You have my word. We’d like you to stay. You’ve been good to my mother and it’ll be hard to find someone as capable as you.”

It all sounded forced and Ken assumes that other was probably aiming for something akin to reassuring but he feels nothing of that sort. He drags a long inhale from his cigarette.  “Thank you.” He stops and filters the anger and profanities swirling in his head.. “Was going public not a good move? If you don’t mind me asking, that is.  _Sir_ .”

Chairman Hirai stays quiet for a while, a little lost on his own. “It was a good move.” He starts slowly. “But it’s not enough. We have to do some drastic move.”

“Was closing the in-house recording studios not drastic enough?” Ken thinks of his colleagues and their undeterred loyalty to this already-ruined company; he thinks of the alleged fairness of this world and how badly uninformed people are.

The Chairman looks Ken sharply, and Ken considers himself a bit victorious. He does not regret his words even just a little bit.

Chairman throws his cigarette butt at the ground and stomps on it, “Not drastic enough, apparently.” He spats, annoyance edging from his shaky voice.

“Sir, with all due respect, is Miss Julie informed of this action?”

“My mother has been notified of this. If she have agreed, that’s a different topic altogether. But,” He pauses, looking visibly uncomfortable. “She’d rather let go a few people than go down the buyout path.”  

He then looks back at Ken, challenging. In a blink of an eye, he’s back on his game – traces of the slumped man weary and troubled are gone. He’s standing tall, all imposing and his presence screams importance. Ken has always wondered if this skill is something few people are born with: the talent to live in different skins everyday and the smooth transition to different personas, to discern which is appropriate at the moment. To be two-faced and be good at it.

“Well I have to go ahead. It probably doesn’t need to be said anymore but this is a confidential matter so please try to keep this information to yourself, Mr. Hirmochi. Only until we sort out the retrenchment packages with Human Resources. ” He looks at him straight before breaking into a painfully polite smile. “Have a nice day.”

And with that, Chairman Hirai marches out and the sound of his steps clicking against the concrete floor is intimidating and determined.  With a numbing pain in his temples and trembling fingers as he works on his cigarette, Ken looks up at the sky, thinking –

_Maybe it’s time to go back to Hyogo_ .

 


	17. Epilogue

 

It takes Junko all morning to find a suitable black dress for Julie’s funeral service. She arrives too early and she awkwardly tells Julie’s relatives that ‘no she isn’t _that_ niece from _that_ side of the family’.

She had just one meeting with Julie but she feels indebted to attend her service. The old woman left an impression on her. The way she looks at you, touches you and talks to you is easy, familiar and comforting. She’s unnervingly polite in the first fifteen minutes of their meeting but she probably decided that she’s too old for that and dropped her pretense and went unabashedly blunt to Junko. And Junko saw how the glint in the older woman’s eyes brightened as she humored Junko with her abreast frankness. Julie reminds Junko of her own grandmother in the flimsiest sense but the truth is no poor child deserves such a conniving woman to be their dear old grandmother.

She had heard about Julie’s passing from her mother who is in Okinawa at the moment, knee-deep busy with that dance school she founded a while back. Upon hearing the news over a short phone call with someone from Avex, Takako stares at the kettle on the stove for a long time until the water boils and the loud wailing sound from the kettle snaps her out of her trance. She says she wishes to be there, asking to extend her condolences to the family but she doesn’t explain what is that pressing and urgent issue a neighborhood dance school  _in the middle of a class break_ has that needs her undivided attention. And Junko didn’t insist on details anymore. Her mother has her reasons.

Junko assumes that it would be a quiet affair, and that being a private person Julie would have previously requested and arranged to only have the closest family and friends to be present. But the Jimusho knows or rather, won’t allow such thing. They only know how to organize the biggest, grandest events and Julie, being their matriarch for several years, only deserves the best. A meticulously-arranged blanket of lotus flower and lily cover the base of Julie’s coffin. The large ceremony hall is decked in giant walls of white and yellow chrysanthemum and at the middle of the wall, there’s a picture of Julie, gray haired and wrinkly skin, but she looks a bit healthier, a couple years younger but still with that distinctive, ever-present sly smile of hers.

Despite the ostentatious setting somehow they manage to still pull it off as a solemn service. The respect and, arguably, the love of the industry people for Julie is felt through all the snippets of conversations and stories Junko hears that afternoon. All the major media outlets have representatives present but they do not have any recording devices. They linger among themselves and speak anecdotes of their brief encounters with Julie. The stories vary from heartwarming to embarrassing. Junko has caught herself grinning as she eavesdrops some broadsheet writers relive that one incident where Julie hurled a fire extinguisher at their EIC when he threatened to run some story on a newly debuted group.

With a loud buzz and murmuring from the crowd, Junko notices the party from Avex has arrived – the head of Avex himself, Mr. Hiro Yoda and a couple other high ranking officers walk in with their head bowed down. From where he was kneeling, Chairman Hirai hurries off to the entourage and helps Mr. Yoda settle. The older man seems visibly upset the whole wake but he tries vainly to show little emotion and doesn’t speak to anyone.

The priest reads the sutra and the whole hall goes silent. As Chairman Hirai lights an incense, Junko sees Akanishi’s quiet retrieving form. He’s wearing a black suit and an ill-fitting coat, an equally black umbrella hanging from the crook of his elbows. He looks small with his back hunched and for a split second Junko wishes to run after him and apologize for the misunderstanding. He seems to be a good man and Junko would love to talk to him again in the future, but today she’ll let him be on his own.

Junko and her mother had a long and tearful conversation. They’ve been dealing with Enou’s passing on their own in the past and haven’t allowed themselves to grieve completely and openly. Junko apologized for doubting her mother, feeling completely silly and broken but Takako assured her again and again that it didn’t matter and instead apologized for not noticing how Junko was suffering and doubting all this time.

Junko had also dropped by her brother’s music lounge and saw that it’s been relatively successful. He seemed to be coping well until he saw Junko on his doorstep and they both broke down and cried themselves silly, clinging to one another like they’re kids again and someone tried to one-up them in a game of tag.

It will be a long time until they accept that their father is gone and everyday will be a painful reminder. And even if they ultimately chose to deal with their loss separately, they know – and Junko knows especially – that her mother will always be there for her, with her warm, reassuring words and calming and familiar laughter; and her brother, who reminds her so much of their father from his gentle mannerisms of scratching the back of his ears when he’s thinking, to his tendency of leaving the windows open and to the way he blindingly adores their mother.   

“He’s on his way back to the States today.”

Junko whips her head to see who just spoke and is faced with the young man she met in Julie’s office before.

As she stares at him, the young man coughs self-consciously, “Sorry – I just saw you looking at Mr. Akanishi.” He says quickly and Junko feels a little warm swirling deep in her chest.

“It’s Hiromichi, by the way. Hiromichi Ken. I don’t know if you remember but I was there when – ”

“I remember.” Junko cuts him off. “Hamada, Junko.”

Later, as the Avex entourage is about to leave the funeral service, Junko will see Mr. Yoda place a reassuring hand on Chairman Hirai’s shoulder. The older man will not whisper or talk to the Jimusho Chairman, but he will just nod at him, briefly and it will take an inhumanely strength from Chairman Hirai to not breakdown and cry right there and then.

About seven weeks after Julie’s body is cremated and the dust has settled, the news of Avex and Johnny & Associate merger will headline all the major broadsheets and the internet will collapse in hysteria. It isn’t the buyout Julie had dreaded and is a rather unexpected move from Avex, showing that there’s compassion left among the industry players.

Julie’s work to tie all loose ends in the company before she died will bear fruit as the agency will slowly regain its footing, reinventing itself to become a competent entertainment giant once again.  

And all of this will happen in the near future but presently,  _something_ has clicked in Junko’s mind and she suddenly  _remembers_ . Junko is then thanking Julie’s blessed prankster soul for this opportunity the older woman could only divinely orchestrated. In the most unlikely place and time, Junko sees her Ken of the seaside village of Hyogo again. The very Ken who is currently asking her quite nervously:

“Hey.” He pauses, eyes wild and unsure, “I just realized that – well, you look familiar? Have you ever been in Hyogo before? It’s a town near Kobe...” Ken trails off unsurely, blinking and he is looking like he’s going to be sick.

Junko will say yes and in few years, she’ll hear from the grapevine that Akanishi and his wife have relocated back in Japan with their adopted son. Takako will invite Akanishi’s small family to a badly-cooked dinner and Junko’s daughter with Ken will have regular play dates with Akanishi’s son every Friday afternoon well until they reach grade school.

Akanishi will eventually reprimand her and ask her to call him Jin. And she will.

And one day, she’ll visit Enou’s grave in the hills of Hyogo, still missing him but she’ll realize as she methodically cleans his grave that she has finally accepted that he’s gone and that she has moved on. 

And that day will not be a grim day, but it will be a beginning.

 

End

**Author's Note:**

> I promised [Harle](http://our-scars.livejournal.com/) an AkaHara fic in 2009. Welp. Look, it's 2015. That's why when I promise that I will write you a fic, either don't believe it or expect it will come around 5 years later. Sorry, Harle. ):
> 
> God, it's been years so I can't remember anymore those kind people who have read the drafts of this fic but special shout-out to my ever-loyal beta reader, [Belle](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Bellemainec) who did several beta reads of this through-out the years. And of course, [Tin](http://harvestmoon16.livejournal.com/profile) who doesn't have a single clue who these folks are but willingly beta read this like a champ.
> 
> Lastly, this fic is for that three people who still remember that Jin used to date Uehara and that one? two? people who is still willing to read a Jin-centric fic in 2015. Enjoy! :) Let me know what you think!


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